Antlers: A Tale of the Marauders
by Vaime
Summary: MWPP era. When two girls from different schools transfer to Hogwarts in their third year to take the places of two students who no one seems to want to talk about they find themselves thrust into the Marauders Hogwarts... [Remus, Sirius, James, Peter]
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One: Not Actually A Chapter But Really A Long-Winded Explanation.**

Right. This is the re-edited, re-vamped, re-everythinged version of Antlers. A long time ago two girls (Sophie and I) decided to write a piece of fanfiction just because we had nothing better to do with our time. We spent ages on it and it ended up being not all that bad. However, things changed. It never ended up being finished as we both discovered boys and then Pie and I split ways and sort of fell out. Long story.

But the point is, lately I've been bored as I have no life. So I sat down at my computer and pulled out the whole Antlers… The first thing I thought was "Oh god. This is terrible, terrible writing."

So what did I decide to do? Completely re-write the huge fat piece of fanfiction that is; Antlers. Expect shorter chapters and better grammar. Don't worry, you'll still have the same giant fluff-fest, there will be no plot whatsoever, only this time… I might actually update once in a while! That'll be nice now won't it?

So, that's pretty much the end of my ramblings. I'll put in a bit of Sophie's commentary, because it does give a lovely background into the world of Antlers.

_Hi. I'm not really a reveiwer. I'm Pie, the infamous co-author. Spanky submitted this, and then told me, which is why I'm a bit late in adding my commentary.  
Thankyou so much to everyone who actually even reads a TINY bit of this. Its soo long. Antlers at the moment is 119 pages, and there are a whole heap more chapters after this, so Sazz will post them soon, hopefully. I will be amazed if anyone actually reads the whole thing so yeah..._

_A few things-_

_Explanation about the name:  
Antlers started after Spanky and I read HP5, and fell in love with the flashback Marauders scene.  
Around the same time, Spanky found a hilarious fanfic called "Do Antlers make you Horny?". We decided to do a fanfic based around Sirius and James, and it started quite shalowly, when I claimed James, and Sarah claimed Sirius and Remus (then told me I was left with Peter). So the title of Antlers was originally "Antlers make Sophie Horny", but I protested, and so it was shortened._

_The thing with Antlers is that it has no plot. Plus, after almost a year (July 24th) of writing and 100+ pages, it's only a week and a half into school. But An entertaining and eventful week and a half, I should hope._

_The name Iseult comes from...Arthurian Mythology!  
Iseult was the daughter of the king of Ireland, and was supposed to be very beautiful, as well as a good healer. She was engaged to the king of Cornwall (I think) when she met Tristan, a noble young knight. (Sierra's brother is called Tristan, but this was a coincedence of Sazza using names that I've used before. There is no connection between the two characters. That would just be creepy.) Anyway, Tristan and Iseult fell in love, which was forbidden because she was about to get married. She got married, he pined for her, and also got married. (Strange)  
Eventually, Tristan got very ill, and he knew that only Iseult could heal him. He sent a message to her to come to him, and told his wife to watch at the window for his ship which would bring her to him. If the ship had white sails, it would mean that Iseult had come to heal him, if it had black sails, it would mean that the ship had returned without her.  
The ship returned with white sails, but Tristan's wife, Elaine (again, I think) lied out of jealousy, and told her husband that Iseult had not come. Tristan died of sorrow, and when Iseult arrived and learnt of his death, she died of a broken heart.  
But really, I just thought the name sounded pretty. Also, Iseult's French, and Morte D'Arthur was french. Her sisters, Ysabeau and Guninvere, are named after Arthurian characters as well, Guinivere obviously was King Arthur's wifer, and Ysabeau was her sister in some versions. Olivier is just a random French name. Peregrine, Iseult's last name, Peregrine, comes from the Peregrine falcons which fly everywhere around Queenstown, where I go to ski :).  
Other names in Antlers with Historical/Mythological significance-  
Alessandro Corbeaux-  
Alessandro (spelt with two L's by sarah because she cant spell) is the Italian (I think) version of Alexander, and was on a poster in our Latin classroom last year :) Corbeaux is the French word for Blackbird, and that was on a poster of animals in my FRENCH classroom. I just cant stick to english, as anyone who read the first chapter will have noticed.  
You wont have got to the quidditch teams yet, but i'll post them to make sure that you are all reminded of what a smart-arse I am. (sorry, couldnt resist)  
Nike Green - Has nothing to do with the fact that she is jamaican, and is not named after the label. Nike (pronounced Nik-kay according to Mr Flemming)was the greek goddess of Victory.  
Will Scarlet, Quidditch captain - Will Scarlet was one of Robin Hood's merry men!  
Jacques Morrigan - Jack! Jacques was just a cool, french name, and Morrigan...I think its something to do with...To be honest, i'm not sure really.  
Others-  
Sandy Canyon-For taking the piss out of a guy we once knew at tennis called Sandy. Sarah told him that Sandy was a girls name.  
David Jones-If you are Australian or a New Zealander, you will know that this is the name of a department store in Sydney.  
Sierra is just a generally cool name, dont you think? Go sazza for that._

_FINALLY-  
There are various mentions of people we know (especially in reference to marrying filmstars)such as Kate and Elijah, Sarah Blue and Orlando, Arena and Johnny Depp.  
Sarah Blue, is of course, Spanky (Lucky cow, wish I married Orlando...) . Spanky's real surname is not Blue. I had a daydream, around the time when I was writing the bit where they first enter the great hall, where I was randomly on Oprah. And I was talking about who inspired me to write books. And I started talking about my friend "Sarah Blue". And all the audience jumped up, and said "YOU KNOW SARAH BLUE? THE GREATEST WRITER OF ALL TIME? OH MY GOD!" and so the interveiw slowly drifted towards all the famous people I knew.  
I tell that story to everyone so that when Sarah is rich and famous and has changed her name, I can charge her lots and lots of money to say that i predicted it and that she should pay me to predict more things in future.  
Really sorry for ranting. Nobody will read this. Wonder how long it is._

_Anyway  
Bye, lots of love and thanks to you guys who review, whether you read my rant or not.  
Fondly,  
Sophie/Pie/Iseult and Friends.  
(seeing as we all know that Si and Ise are really just who Saz and I would like to be, really.)_


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: What Actually Is Chapter One, But Isn't. For Reasons.**

_**Sierra**_

Sierra Rehine sat on her brand new Hogwarts-regulation school trunk, sulking. Her two older brothers, supposed to be helping her board the school train for the first time, were nowhere to be seen. Actually, she could see Justin, he was standing less than twenty meters away flirting with some blonde muggle standing by the ticket booth. The girl (whom Sierra had to admit was incredibly pretty) was giggling and stroking his arm seductively. Resisting the urge to vomit Sierra stood up and walked over to her elder brother.

"Where's Trista?" She said in a sickly-sweet voice, holding onto Justin's other arm and batting her eyelashes at him. The blonde glared at her, smiled back at Justin and walked off. Justin stared after her, looking rather disspointed.

"Oh please," Sierra said, letting go of his arm and giving him a disgusted look "She had the IQ of a hinkypunk. And not a very intelligent one at that."

"Yeah, but even still. I don't get to chase girls every day."

"Oh of course, please forgive me," she said, clutching her hand to her chest in mock repentance "I forgot that dear Justin never, ever spends his precious time chasing after mere Muggle girls."

She rolled her eyes, spinning around on the ball of her foot and making her way haughtily back to her trunk and sitting down upon it. Justin followed her and sat next to her. Before long a beaming dusky blonde man walked over, swinging a set of keys around his finger.

"What took so long mate?" asked Justin, as the pair stood up to meet him, Sierra barely reaching the boy's shoulders.

"Carpark." He said simply, putting the keys back into his pocket "Muggles seem to have some uncontrollable urge to make things much smaller than necessary."

"I told you the carpark would be full by the time we got here. But no, you thought you knew better."

"Oh shut up," the elder boy retaliated, "The point is the car is parked, thanks to me. Not that you could have parked it anyway because, ooh, who failed their driving exam for the fourth time last week?"

"Hey," yelled Justin, poking his brother in the chest "That truck sped up at the intersection. I would have had more than enough time to get through the lights if he hadn't…"

"Please you two!" Sierra interrupted angrily, "If you two don't stop arguing and start acting your age I'll miss the school train. And if that happens I swear to god…"

She made a threatening gesture that looked suspicioiusly like someone being castrated before grabbing her trunk and stomping her way to where she assumed the platform for the train must be. She loved her brothers, but putting up with them for long was a nightmare. The problem was, all three siblings were just too different. Thirteen year old Sierra was somewhat a perfectionist, the ice queen of her previous school she had come top in many classes and shunned the attention of her peers. Apart from a couple of select best friends and her family, Sierra preferred to be alone. Twenty year old Justin and the four years senior Tristan were the epitome of the male stereotype. There was nothing on earth they hadn't mocked, at least once anyway.

The boys caught up with Sierra and the trio walked through the barrier to platform nine and three quarters. Sierra held back a slight gasp, it was far more impressive than she could ever have imagined. All around her students of varying ages stood together in clumps, many surrounded by family, trunks and the occasional owl. The platform was full of action as people jostled to get through to meet their friends. Tristan turned and grinned at his younger sister.

"Aah, its exactly as I remember. I'd get on soon if I were you, unless you want to be stuck in a compartment with a bunch of Slytherin scumbags. Try and get the compartment third from the back on the left side." He winked.

Sierra raised an eyebrow, "And I'm guessing that there's a reason for this..."

"Of course!"

"And that would be..."

The boys started laughing uncontrollably, gaining a few odd glances from passers-by. After a good few minutes Justin calmed down enough to tell Sierra to take a look under the seats to see if the words 'Carpe Scrotum' were still etched there.

Sierra rolled her eyes and whacked him on the arm.

"ARGH!" he yelled, clutching his arm "That HURT Si! You're stronger than you realise, Jesus!"

"I know exactly how strong I am thankyou very much," she said, flicking her wavy brown hair back behind her shoulder.

"Now anyway, don't you go and be too good."

"I'll say. We don't want any letters until you've done something really rotten. Something that'll drive old McGonagall completely bonkers."

Sierra rolled her eyes and whacked Justin on the arm he had just finished nursing.

"CRAP! God right on the bruise… I won't be able to sleep on this side tonight!"

"Oh boo-hoo, lets all have a pity party for Justin."

In too much pain to come up with any kind of response, Justin merely glared at her and mumbled something under his breath.

"Now will you please be serious for once?"

Tristan looked rather put out.

"If you insist." Tristan sighed, leaning down and hugging his sister. "Danni's going to miss you heaps, she got all upset this morning. Started crying and everything."

Dani, or Danielle, was Tristan's long-time girlfriend. They'd been together ever since he had graduated from Hogwarts, and everyone considered her part of the family. To Sierra she was the closest thing to a mother. When she had received her letter accepting her transfer to Hogwarts, Justin and Tristan had decided to teach her tricks encouraging her to stir up a bit of trouble. Dani had thought it best to teach Sierra charms that were more 'ladylike'.

After Tristan had finished making sure she had everything, and Justin had finished sulking, he held her at arms length, looking at her seriously.

"Now for the important bit." He said solemnly "No going anywhere near the statute of the old hump-backed witch in the third corridor."

"But if you do happen to pass it, under no circumstances should you tap it's hump with your want and say 'Dissendium'"

"Wise words Justin," Tristan nodded "And if by some accident you do happen to do that, you should not go down the secret passageway that just happens to lead to the cellar of Honeydukes."

"Oh god no Tristan. And I can't stress how much you shouldn't do that. Especaially not if me, you or Danielle are waiting in the three broomsticks."

Tristan released her and Sierra rolled her eyes,

"Who says I want to end up like you two fools? Not being able to even get out for trips to Honeydukes because you had detentions every weekend from doing some prank or another. I have no idea why you're even telling me this."

"Come on, its very useful information."

"Plus your our sister" Tristan shrugged "At some point you're going to turn into a nasty little twat, just like we did."

"Only she started out not being one…"

"Now do you remember all that highly important information that we told you about school?"

Sierra scoffed, "What all that rubbish about how the Astronomy tower is the best place for a night time snog?"

Justin and Tristan looked down at her proudly.

"After all these years of wondering, we finally find that you are actually related to us."

"I'm not going to be doing stupid crap like that anyway."

"Whatever, you better get a move on. Have you got that book Danni gave you?"

"The one about dark creatures?"

"Yeah the huge piece of tree she figured you'd be interested in."

"Yep. Got that. Thank her again by the way I had a skim through it this morning its really good."

"Ok then," Tristan shoved his hands into his pockets. Emotional scenes weren't really his forte. "Guess this is bye for now then."

"See ya round short one" waved Justin.

Sierra grinned and waved back as she pulled her heavy trunk towards the door towards the last carriage. She would have said goodbye, but there was a good chance she'd start sobbing. And turning into a blubbering mess on the first day of her new school wasn't really the impression she was trying to make.

When she reached the carriage doors she turned around and began to attempt to heave the trunk up the stairs. It was easier said than done, as the trunk was weighed down by Sierra's massive collection of books that she couldn't bear to part with.

"Oh bloody hell," she muttered, pulling on the trunk's handle again. It was lodged half up the first step and didn't seem to want to move at all. She was so preoccupied with heaving the stupid thing that she didn't notice the two dark haired boys come up behind her.

"Need some help with that?" asked a voice from behind her.

She looked over her shoulder and glared at the speaker, a good-looking boy with long-ish black hair.

"No, thankyou." She said coldly, before turning back to her trunk and giving it one last almighty heave. It finally pulled free and she stalked past the boy and his similarly arrogant-looking friend with extraordinarily messy black hair. She gave them a disdainful look as she passed them and could vaguely hear one of them muttering 'Feisty' at her departing back. After a moment of searching she found the compartment her brothers had told her about. It took her a bit more searching before she found the words 'Carpe Scrotum' etched into the wood under the seat on the right, along with various other etchings from other Hogwarts students over the years.

She pushed her trunk into the corner retrieving from it the large book Danielle had given her and beginning to read it with intrest. She had gotten up to the third chapter when two identical heads poked around the door, startling her.

"Hello!" Chorused the two heads.

"Uh… hi."

Sierra wasn't really all that keen on being interrupted, but the girls seemed to take the less-than-friendly greeting as an invitation of friendship and entered the compartment, dumping their things across from where Sierra was perched beside the window. The two girls were both dirty-blonde, tall and a bit on the skinny side. One was slightly taller than the other, but apart from that slight difference they were absolutely identical.

"You must be starting Hogwarts this year, one of the new kids right?" asked the shorther girl. Sierra was far too taken aback to do anything but nod slowly. The girl ignored it and beamed at her.

"I'm Stephanie by the way, and that's my twin Cara-Jane." Stephanie pointed at Cara-Jane, who gave her a smouldering look.

"I beg of you, please do not ever call me Cara-Jane." Said the taller girl "Two of the most idiotic names in all existence and they just happen to be my name."

She sat down next to Sierra while Stephanie pushed their trunks under the seats and sat down at the window opposite Sierra.

"I'm pretty sure Mum must have still been high on the epidural when she named us. Anyway just call me CJ, much easier to remember."

"And call me Steph." The two girls smiled at Sierra and she couldn't help but smile back.

"I'm Sierra."

"Ohh nice name, is that Spanish?" asked Steph

"I honestly have no idea."

"Sounds like it," said CJ, fiddling with a string coming loose on the hem of her robes

"Its really pretty anyway. Reminds me of the ocean."

It wasn't long until the three girls were talking animatedly about Quidditch and the like when a strawberry blonde haired girl stepped lightly into the compartment.

**_Iseult_**

Iseult opened the door and stepped in, her suitcase in tow. Flicking her hair out behind her, she pulled her suitcase into the middle of the room. Three girls about her age were sitting on one of the leather-covered benches in the carriage, admiring a broomstick that a pretty brown-haired girl was stroking fondly. Iseult gulped slightly; she was not the most confident teenager on the planet. She was just mustering up her courage to say hello when...

"Hi" said the tallest mousey blonde girl, grinning from ear to ear. A girl who must have been her twin also beamed at Iseult warmly, making the extremely nervous newcomer seem slightly more welcomed.

Iseult smiled. "Hey, I'm Iseult, and you are..."

Grinning even more at Iseult's smile, the girl who had spoken before said, "I'm Steph and this is..."

"CJ" her sister interrupted, glaring at Steph. Iseult raised her eyebrows but left them to themselves.

Sitting down on the bench opposite the other three girls, Iseult looked over the twin's heads and out the window, only to see that the train had just started moving and families and friends were waving hysterically at their kin.

The only student in the otherwise empty carriage who had not bombarded her with smiles was the brown haired girl, who had now put her broom to the side and was absorbed in a book. Feeling a connection with this quiet girl, Iseult was just about to ask her what she was reading when four boys stampeded into the carriage. The girl so intent on her book looked up for a second, then blushed slightly and pulled the volume up to cover her face. Iseult smirked, and looked up to see that all four boys were holding wands and peering around the room.

"What do you want?" said Steph, who Iseult could now tell was the shorter of the two identical sisters. The boys jumped ever so slightly, evidently so intent on their search that they had not realized that there were girls in the carriage. Two of the boys, obviously the group's ringleaders, slunk their wands into their coats and put their hands in their pockets. The taller of the two drew his hand back through his hair, making it stick out messily.

_'Oh God,'_ thought Iseult. These two were obviously THAT sort of boys. Evidently some things never change no matter what school you are at. She could tell CJ was thinking the same thing, her eyebrows were raised and she was frowning slightly. Steph looked a bit more interested in them, and the brunette girl, (did it say Serra on her trunk?) obviously knew one of them from somewhere, because she had determinedly stuck her nose even further into her book.

The dickheads in question however, evidently had not noticed any of this, because they just continued looking smug. Iseult tried, but failed not to notice that they were extremely good looking. From the looks on their faces, they knew it too. One of them, a guy with long, almost sleek black hair and dark eyes grinned mischievously.

"Have any of you girls noticed a really ugly, really pasty, really greasy faced guy..."

"With greasy hair, crooked runny nose and no friends...?" broke in the other boy, flashing a smile at his audience.

Serra (if that was her name) sat up slowly and looked at the four boys; pursing her lips, she lifted her chin and looked at them piercingly. At this point CJ started laughing hysterically, then the laugh quickly became a cough, and at last her laughing spasm had finished. Everyone ignored her more or less because they were intent on listening for Serra's reaction to the boy's cruel statement.

"No." she said quite forcefully. The longhaired boy looked at her and his eyes widened in recognition, but Iseult saw, and before he could open his mouth she said,

"I saw a pale guy in the 2nd carriage a while ago."

She gave them all a look that said, "Get Out or you will feel the full force of our hate" and the boys, who didn't look much older than them at all, unwillingly shuffled out through the door. Before he left the messy haired boy nodded his head to Serra and the twins, and mouthed the words "thank you" at Iseult, a puzzled look on his face. He then swept into the next carriage and shut the door behind him.

Iseult laughed quietly to herself. She had a feeling she knew why he looked so puzzled and confused. He couldn't figure out why his "dazzling charms" hadn't worked on any of the girls yet. (He obviously hadn't noticed Steph.) Iseult smiled. If those boys thought that they were that great, they had another thing coming.

A bright peal of laughter echoed through the carriage. CJ was chuckling loudly, and Iseult couldn't help grinning.

"Those four are such idiots!" CJ squeaked. "The guy they were going on about, Snape, peered into the carriage while they were in here! I could hardly stop myself from bursting out laughing!"

Steph frowned.

"You're such a boy-shadow sis." Giggled CJ at the expression on her face. "Oh, I-zolte? Is that how you say it?" Iseult nodded. "I forgot to introduce you to Sierra. She's new too, like you..." CJ furrowed her arched eyebrows. "You are new this year, aren't you?"

Iseult and Sierra (Iseult could see the thin line of an 'I' on her trunk now) both nodded and said, rather too enthusiastically, "Yes!" at the same time. Everybody smiled.

"Ok, so I suppose we don't really know each other much yet." She saw Iseult's puzzled face. "Oh yeah, we only met Sierra here about two minutes before you came in."

"Maybe three minutes." Said Steph.

Iseult rolled her eyes. She had never known two sisters to fight so pettily!

Steph must have sensed her feeling, because she said pointedly, "Do you have any terrifying siblings, Iceult, or is CJ the worst of the worst?" CJ poked her tongue out at Steph, but Iseult continued;

"Its said like Eye-zolt, not Ice-olt, and no, CJ is not the worst sibling ever, although you two do bicker!"

"Thanks," said CJ, sounding rather hurt.

"I have two younger sisters, Ysabeau and Gwin, short for Guinevere, who are seven and twins as well, like you two, although not identical, and I have an 18-year-old brother...No! Steph! Don't look at me that way, that's how all my muggle friends look at me when I talk about Olive!"

"Oh, his names Olivier." She added on sight of their questioning expressions. (AN: pronounced Oliviae)

CJ nodded and turned to Sierra.

"And you Sierra, I saw you waving at a guy on the platform, who was he?" Iseult looked a bit disappointed that they had broken off her chance to tell her family history, but she pulled her suitcase nearer to the bench and sat on top of it to listen to Sierra.

"Yeah, you've been awfully quiet," said Iseult good-humouredly, grinning at Sierra, who had finally put her book away and was ready to talk.

**_Sierra_**

Sierra reluctantly put her book back into her trunk and turned to Iseult, who was now sitting across from her and next to CJ and Steph.

"I was escorted here by my two brothers," Stephs eyes flashed at this, "They both went to Hogwarts when they were younger. That's why when they found there was a space open they made me transfer this year."

"Where did you go before Hogwarts?" said CJ interestedly.

"Tora Academy."

"Never heard of that one, I thought you might have gone to Beauxbatons or Durmstrang."

Sierra shook her head. "Yeah, you wouldn't have heard of it – it's quite a small school."

Steph laughed, "Hogwarts is anything but small, even Professor Dumbledore doesn't know where all the rooms are!"

Sierra knew that Professor Dumbledore was the headmaster of Hogwarts from what Tristan had told her years ago. CJ nodded and turned back to Sierra.

"So what are your brothers called?"

"Tristan and Justin. Tristan's twenty four and Justin's twenty, they're easy to tell apart. Tristan's the tall dark blonde one and Justin is darker one."

"Cool," said Steph "So are they si-

"Do you have any sisters?" CJ interrupted, rolling her eyes at the overeagerness of her sister.

"No, but Tristan's girlfriend, Danielle is kind of like a sister." Sierra turned to Iseult but before she could say anything the dark haired boys came back into the carrage._ 'Damn,'_ thought Sierra, _'Why did I put that ruddy book away?'_ The one with longish hair that had offered to help her with her trunk before beamed at the girls.

"Hello there ladies! Sorry to intrude but the compartment we were...inhabiting before seems to have been taken over by a bunch of Slytherin swines."

Sierra glanced at Steph, who appaeared to be swooning.

"Although I must say Padfoot, I've never seen Snape look so good in pink" the boys snickered and Sierra got the fleeting impression of a younger Justin and Tristan.

At this point Sierra noticed that Iseult had slotted her wand in her jeans pocket and was trying to get past the blockade of boys standing by the door. The messy-haired boy seemed very unwilling to let her pass, and the longhaired one was too busy perfecting his "effortless" fringe to notice her.

In the end Iseult said "Excuse Me!" loudly to a skinny blonde boy who was reading a book on transfiguration (Sierra was impressed, she didn't think any of these guys would have the intelligence to read) and this boy smiled at her and moved aside. Iseult slipped through the gap quickly, and for a second Sierra heard rain on the roof through the open door.

The messy haired boy glared at the slamming door, and kicked the blonde boy hard in the shins. The racket following this soon subsided, to be replaced with a stunned silence in the compartment.

"So anyway," the first boy continued, trying to bridge the silence. "We thought we could sit with you." Sierra narrowed her eyes and tried to think of something cutting to say, but Steph grinned and said a bit too loudly,

"Oh sure! I mean we'd love to have some company!"

Apparently Sierra wasn't the only one who was less than happy at this intrusion as CJ rolled her eyes and exhaled loudly. The boys grinned, and the first one sat down next to Sierra, a bit too close for comfort. She got up huffily and sat back down next to CJ, crossing her arms across her chest. She was sure CJ would be better company. The boy look momentarily hurt, but covered it up quickly as the others sat down and introduced themselves as; "Sirius Black, (the long-haired one with the 'naturally' seductive fringe) James Potter, (the messy-haired arrogant one who kicked Remus) Remus Lupin, (the blonde one who was at least polite and literate) and Peter Pettigrew (the pale one with dirty coloured hair and a pinched face)."

The conversation that followed was between Steph, the boys and – to a lesser extent – CJ. Sierra refused to partake and was looking pointedly out the window. This continued for a while until they were interrupted by a large CRASH as the window jumped upwards of its own accord, making everyone jump – Peter more than anyone. It had stopped raining, Sierra noted. Even more strange than this was Iseult's suitcase, which was unzipping itself seemingly of its own accord. Her uniform removed itself from the bag and flew out the window towards the back of the train. The window slammed back down with a loud thud and the suitcase zipped itself back up.

This stunned everybody, as even in the wizarding world it's not common for clothes to wander off by themselves. Since nobody really knew how to fill the silence after that, the boys decided to leave; making it clear that the only reason they were there in the first place was to chat up girls.

Steph, however, was very unwilling for Black to go, and she insisted that he have a discussion with her about Quidditch. This suited him just fine, so he said goodbye to the rest of his band and started an animated discussion with STeph about the Winbourne Wasps. CJ and Sierra groaned inside their heads and mentally kicked Stephanie a thousand times.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three: Of Werewolves and Madness**

**_Iseult_**

Meanwhile...

Iseult slipped out of the carriage, the door slamming shut behind her. The train would arrive in an hour or so and she wanted to put on her robes before they got there, not to mention get away from the boys Steph was undoubtedly chatting up in her compartment. She turned to see the countryside rushing past the train. It was raining. Ignoring the giddying blur of grey and green flashing past her, Iseult pushed head forward through a sheet of wind-blown rain that had been blown underneath the overhanging roof, which was all the protection from the elements that was provided in the narrow outside corridor of the Hogwarts express. She surged through the wall of unusually strong rain onto the compartment bridge.

Outside of the carriage compartment Iseult was in the open air, with only an overhanging roof and iron barriers to make the divider between the carriages anything more than a metal bridge between the two compartments. How the food carriage could cross this perilous straight was beyond Iseult, but she dared not stay and ponder for fear of almost drowning! She was already soaked through to her jumper, her overcoat was sopping, and only after half a minute of being in the rain. Iseult hastily crossed the bridge and opened the door into a warm dry carriage. The first student she saw was a girl who was peering at her down her nose. Iseult had the impression that she resembled a wet dog, thus she walked down the rest of the compartment with her head held high, so as not to see the people looking at her like she was a fish out of water. She failed to notice the pale hook-nosed boy who was tailing her, although she did notice that the sound of rain on the roof had stopped almost as soon as she had walked in.

"Just my luck." She muttered under her breath. "I swear I'm jinxed sometimes!" (This is the magical world. When you say you are jinxed, it is an actual possibility.)

_'Oh, great,'_ she thought after glancing down at a silly little first year who hastily looked the other way when Iseult looked at her. _'People will think I'm crazy now too, because I'm talking to myself. Greeeeaaat way to start a new school year Iseult. Exceptionally clever.'_

Ahead, a door marked "Rest rooms" loomed at the end of the (very long it seemed to Iseult) carriage. Two silhouettes of a witch and wizard were ballroom dancing below the sign. Iseult kicked the door open casually with her foot, and at this disturbance the wizard's silhouette tripped over and the pair ended up in a black heap.

"Sorry!" she whispered softly, and quickly shut the door before she caused any more damage.

The bathrooms carriage was decorated in red-and-cream striped wallpaper, and two cream plush chairs with matching poufs lay in one corner. Seeing another door with a dancing female silhouette on it, Iseult carefully pushed this one open, and sat down on a chair, only to realise...She had left her uniform in her suitcase, in the other carriage, with those stupid boys, and although it wasn't raining now, she had a niggling feeling that if she stepped outside again, it would start to pour. And possibly rain some sort of animal if she was really unlucky.

So, magic was the only way to go. Iseult pulled out her wand, (12 ¼ inches, Rosewood inlaid with mother of pearl, unicorn hair, quite springy with a good feel in the hand and beautiful decoration, a great all rounded wand, as Mr Olivander had said) and she bit her lip a little too hard, and then she said the magic words.

"Accio, Uniform!"

There was a long pause, but after a few moments, Iseult's robes flew in the open window, hovered in the air for a few moments, before folding themselves and dropping into a pile at Iseult's feet.

She changed hastily into the white shirt, embroidered at the sleeves and pockets with the school's crest, the above-knee-length pleated skirt which was not-so similar to girl's uniform skirts all over the world, and finally the robe. The long formal robes were heavy and black, lined with black satin and had a large hood, edged with snow-white ermine fur flecked with black. Iseult loved her robes. They were sleek and elegant and designed for snowy winter days. But, they were way too formal. Plus, there was a chance she would get them soaked pretty quickly. She sighed, and reluctantly sent them back to her suitcase.

"Oicca, Robe!"

And the black bundle zoomed back out the window.

Iseult pulled on her emblazoned jersey and her normal school robe, which was fitted (thank god, she hated baggy clothes) with flared sleeves and a curved cut bottom, and pushed open the doors to the main part of the bathrooms carriage. The two chairs were still vacant, and Iseult dumped her clothes on one of them and moved to the large mirror on one wall. As she had thought, the rain had flattened her hair to her head. Despite the charm on her hair, which would have been a few weeks old anyway, the rain had completely messed up her perfect reddy-gold waves of hair that had rippled down her back previously. Only magical rain messes up charms that easily, she thought. There must be a witch or wizard nearby doing weather magic, and their spell must have gone outa control.

Magical rain or not, her hair was a mess, so Iseult pointed her wand at the crown of her head and whispered.

"Mes Cheveux rouges-blonds, Tu as perfecto!"

It was a dead-easy French charm she had learnt from her French cousin, Elaine. The French "belle-magiques" were the most effective and simplest spells for hair, and now her hip-length reddy-blonde hair again flowed down her back in smooth waves. She was wondering if the carriage would be free of those stupid boys yet when...

Iseult's train of thought was broken by three slow claps. In the mirror Iseult saw the hook-nosed boy that the other boys had described to them before. He was sitting in one of the other chairs with a peculiar smile on his face. Iseult twirled to face him coolly.

"So, you can do magic then?" He was smirking from ear to ear. "I thought that you were just another stupid mud-blood at first, but then I saw the uniform flying past the windows."

Iseult flushed at the reference to mud-bloods. She would have liked to have told him that she indeed was muggle-born, which was untrue but would have been worth it for the look on his face. She hadn't intended for anyone to see her doing magic. However, she felt bold. She was only a third year and those were not easy charms she had done, even for a competent fourth-year witch or wizard.

"Well what can you do, then?" she said, surprising herself with the confidence in her voice. She knew she was good at magic; she just had a niggling feeling that this guy might be better...

The boy made a scoffing sound.

"I, Serverus Snape, am far beyond the use of petty charms like 'Accio'." His wand, now in his hand, was glowing slightly. It wanted to perform the spell he had started to say. He smiled, and when he did so the expression looked odd, out of place on his face. Turning away he concentrated on a vase of flowers on a bench across the room.

"Fox-glove" he muttered, pointing his wand at the vase. A stalk of foxglove flowers floated into his hand. He handed the sprig to Iseult, who took it gingerly, holding it away from her body. Just as she tried to think of something to say to excuse her, the door burst open. Iseult, who's back was to the door, spun to see the blond-haired boy and the short, pinched boy from the compartment walk in. The blond boy looked from Serverus, to Iseult, to the flower, to Iseult's distressed face, and tried to conceal a smirk. Iseult turned back to see Serverus scowling, his expression one of extreme hatred, and gulped. She could sense a fight coming on, and she did not want to be a witness. Serverus scowled even more deeply and continued.

"Accio..." he was looking at the blond boy, grinning evilly. "Accio Lupin." Out of the vase came a bluey-grey flower, which Serverus made to hover in the air for a moment before grasping it with his hand.

"This flower causes madness," he was talking to Iseult but looking at the blond boy, who was glaring at him from the doorway. "Traditionally, it is the flower of werewolves and their brutality..." he turned the flower over, before dropping it to the floor and crushing it with his foot. Iseult looked back at the door, more than a little bit frightened by this incredibly creepy boy. The two boys who had been there before had disappeared entirely. Iseult decided that the time to be nice and polite was over. This guy was incredibly scary. Incredibly scary. He looked like a vampire, the sort that you read about in muggle books. Iseult took a deep breath and addressed the vampire-look-alike. Amazingly the confidence flowed through her voice once again.

"Lupin may cause madness, but Foxglove seeds are deadly." She handed him back the flower, which he took graciously enough, but when he looked up there was malice in his eyes. But... he wasn't looking at her...

Iseult swerved around to see exactly who she guessed she would see. The arrogant boy from the carriage was evidently deciding whether to talk to her or have a go at Serverus. Iseult was entirely sick of being caught talking to people she did not want to talk to, and she didn't want to see a fight, so she grabbed her clothes and swept out of the carriage without a passing look at either of the boys. Guarding the door was the blonde boy and the uncannily rat-like boy with dirty-coloured hair. She had a strong urge to kick both of them for failing to get rid of Serverus (Snape was it?) when they had first walked in. She restrained herself, however, and swept off past them. Behind her a slightly squeaky voice exclaimed,

"Hey Moony, isn't Sirius supposed to be meeting us here now?"

Iseult didn't hear the reply; she was too busy trying to remember the umbrella charm. No. She couldn't remember it, but an improvisation would do.

Iseult opened the carriage door and just as she thought, it suddenly started pouring with rain. Desperately trying to recall Latin classes, Iseult stepped through the door, saying,

"Anti-Aqua-Villa!" It worked, but not with the simple effect she would have wanted. Iseult found herself in a bubble devoid of water. She could see the rain drops evaporating as they came close to her. She couldn't help thinking of what would happen if she were to jump into a lake...

Iseult hurried to the end of the carriage, and opened the door to her compartment, where Steph was deep in conversation with the boy who she now assumed was Sirius. After uttering the necessary spell to destroy the anti- water charm ("Anti-Aqua Magica Mortuus!"), she sat down beside CJ and Sierra. Steph was obviously boring Sirius quite intensely.

"Sirius," she called.

Sirius looked around. Quite happy that a girl apart from Steph was talking to him (he was not really used to making conversation with girls, but seeing as the others had abandoned him he had no choice), he ignored Steph's frowns completely and piped up rather overenthusiastically, (That's just how much Steph bored him) "Yes! I'm Sirius who are you?"

"Oh...I'm Iseult and your friends are waiting for you by the toilet compartment." "Oh." He said, looking disappointedly at Sierra. "Why?" he added hopefully.

Iseult shrugged. "Well, I..." she stopped and collected herself. "It has something to do with that Serverus...Snape...Him." Iseult hoped this was sufficient explanation to get rid of him. It was. He sat up very upright, and you could almost see the male dominating instinct flowing into his veins.

"Oh. Ok then." He said, still looking at Sierra in a disappointed fashion. He left. As soon as he did three female heads turned to face Iseult.

"What, on EARTH, just happened?" cried CJ.

"Why did you make him go away?!?!" wailed Steph. "I was just getting on to my joke about the German goldfish!"

"Where have you been, who is Serverus Snape, and how did you know his name was Sirius?" asked Sierra coolly.

So Iseult started from the beginning. Her story was littered with questions and interruptions from CJ and Sierra, and Steph's whines.

"And then I turned around, and Snape was sitting there, and he's sooo scary I swear his mothers a vampire or something! And he was sitting there smirking, and then he started talking about how he had thought I was an incompetent mud-blood..."

"He said that?" CJ exclaimed in horror. The twins had wizard parents but were very close to their muggle grandparents.

"Yes! I was shocked too! And anyway he started giving me a lecture about how he was way beyond my standard of charms..."

"Ooh! Was that after you summoned your clothes to you?"

"Yes, Steph. So he started summoning these flowers and then Moony walked in..."

"Moony?" CJ raised her eyebrows and looked at her twin "I don't know anyone in the school called Moony,"

"Unless he's new?" Steph shrugged in reply.

"Oh yeah, he was the blonde guy. Then..."

"You mean Remus Lupin…" CJ nodded.

"Yeah...Wait." Iseult stopped, thinking. "That makes sense. Snape summoned a Lupin flower, and started talking to us about how it was associated with werewolves and caused madness. He was talking to me but obviously making a point to the blond...Remus."

"Maybe Lupin's mad?" suggested Sierra light-heartedly.

"He might be...or maybe..." CJ was looking thoughtful.

"Maybe What?"

"Maybe he's a Werewolf!!!!" cried CJ, in such a tone that all the girls burst into fits of giggles. Laughter made Steph whineier.

Steph moaned. "But my goldfish joke was really funny!" she glanced at her watch and jumped in her seat.

"We better get changed, guys, its like, half an hour before we get there."

Iseult winced. "I don't suggest you use the toilet carriage, as I have a feeling that a fight may be ongoing there."


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: The Fight**

_**Sierra**_

There was nothing in the world that Sierra Rehine liked more than watching a good fight. Apparently Steph also shared in her passion, as she was attempting to keep up with Sierra as she sprinted towards the tolilets. No, on second thoughts, Sierra realised it was much more likely that she was just going to see those damn guys.

They were almost at the door when Iseult came up behind them.

"You guys, I'm not quite sure you should go in there." She panted.

Sierra glanced at Iseult, then at Steph, who was looking more than a slight bit apprehensive.

"We'll be fine, honestly. Besides I need to know what I'm up against if I ever feel the need to knock the stuffing out of one of them."

Iseult grinned, while Steph looked shocked.

"B-but your, your n-not g-g-going t-to p-p-punch them or anything a-are y-you!" she spluttered, her eyes and mouth wide open.

Sierra grinned evily, "Lets hope for their sakes I don't have to."

She pushed the door open carefully and peered inside. From what she could make out, the boys had begun with a wizards duel, but abandoned it for the more old-fashioned style of muggle fighting. James and Sirius were doing the grunt of the work, while Remus and Peter stood to the side, lazily throwing in jinxes from time to time. For a moment Sierra felt a twang of sympathy for the greasy-haired boy they were beating up. Four on one was hardly fair by anyone's standards, and if there was anything she couldn't stand it was an unfair fight. In a fit of rage she stormed across the room and pulled Sirius off the boy.

"STOP IT!" she yelled, as loudly as she could manage "STOP IT NOW! I DON'T KNOW WHAT HE'S DONE TO GET TO YOU LIKE THAT BUT I'M QUITE SURE HE DOESN'T DESERVE THIS"

The boys stood where they were, too stunned to speak. Sierra could see that by the door Iseult and Steph were also standing stock still, mouths agape. Sirius - now lying on the floor - got up slowly and brushed himself off, his gaze locked on Sierra. The greasy-haired boy they had been terrorizing pushed James off and shot an evil look at Sierra. He walked over to her slowly,

"I don't need some loud mouthed little bitch to fight my battles for me," he hissed menacingly between clenched teeth.

She heared Steph gasp from the door.

"Fine then! I'll leave them to it next time." She snapped angrily "In fact, why don't I help them?"

Before anyone could realise what was happening, Sierra drew her fist back and slammed it hard into the boys nose. A sickening crunch was heard as bone gave way. Steph gasped again and Sierra felt a pang of guilt for hitting him. A trail of deep scarlet ran down his face from his nose. He wiped it with the back of his hand and stepped forward again, glaring down at her. He then murmured something to her that made her hand shoot to her mouth in horror. James stepped forward and glowered at him.

"Don't ever let me hear you say something like that to her again, Snape. If you do I swear I'll..."

Sierra spun around to face him, "Shut it you!" she shouted "I can defend myself perfectly well thank you very much." She turned around and stalked out the door, fists clenched at her sides. Iseult and Steph followed her out meekly. The people who were in the carriage next to the bathroom had obviously heard the chaos as they were looking at her astonishedly.

_'Well at least I'll have something to write back to Tristan and Justin about.' _thought Sierra bitterly, her forehead in her hand. _ 'I haven't even got to school yet and I'm in a fight. Well done Si!'_

It was Steph who finally shattered the awkward silence.

"Well that was err, interesting. Don't usually get scenes like that on the first day."

_'Oh god, what did I do?'_

"Where did you learn to fight like that?"

_'I am in so much trouble!'_

"You've got blood on your hand, did he hurt you?"

_'Oh god, oh god, oh god, oh god!'_

"Sierra? Sierra are you ok?"

Sierra finally realised that the girls were speaking to her.

"Are you ok Sierra? You look a bit pale..." Iseult looked worried.

"No... I'm going to puke!"

And with that she threw up right onto Iseult.

_**Iseult**_

"SHIT!!!" screamed Iseult.

"Well, no its puke actually." Steph pointed out most unhelpfully.

Steph had pushed both Iseult and Sierra into the girl's toilets, because everyone in the outside carriage was staring at them, and the boys had decided to continue the fight anyway, but with the rest of the Slytherins joining in. Suddenly a head popped round the door.

"Oh, hey guys!... Jesus Christ what happened?"

"Oh, hi CJ. Sierra got into a fight with Snape and now she's thrown up all over me!" said Iseult brightly. "Is anyone here any good at removal charms?"

A silence followed. Although any of them could have removed the puke if they had wanted to, Sierra was throwing up in the toilet, CJ was too busy laughing her head off, Iseult's wand was too covered in puke to work, and Steph just didn't want to get dirty. Iseult scowled. But then...an idea formed in her mind. "CJ, go get Lupin." At Iseult's words Steph brightened up immediately.

"What...Who?...Why?" CJ stuttered.

"Go and get Remus Lupin to come and get this shit off of me!!!"

"Ok, Ok," said CJ, hurrying towards the door, she paused and added "Its puke by the way, not shit." Then ran out.

"ARGH!" screamed Iseult in frustration, throwing her wand at the door.

An agonizing two minutes later she appeared dragging Lupin in through the door. Steph fluttered her eyelids at him. He blinked at her stupidly, and turned to CJ.

"Why am I here?" he said, obviously meaning "Why am I in the girl's bathrooms?"

"TO GET THIS SHIT OFF ME!!!" screamed Iseult again.

"Oh. Ok." He was thinking of James and he did not want to get kicked again. Sierra, looking up from the toilet she was throwing up into, saw him look from Iseult to the door and yelled at him,

"No you don't!! Get it off her NOW! I don't care what your friend will do to you, what I do will be worse if you don't help her!!" She paused, and turned to the toilet to puke again. However, Remus's memory of Sierra punching Snape was still very vivid, and he decided that it was best to help.

"Stand up Iseult." he said nervously. Iseult didn't make the comment that she had never told him her name. He pointed the wand at her.

"Removu..."

"Stop!" Iseult called. "I don't want that spell blowing me up by mistake." She took off her robe and lay it out on the floor. He got her point.

"Removus Sordidus!" Remus chanted. Iseult noticed that he was a very elegant spell-caster. The spell worked, but when Iseult went to pick up her robes...

"Shit! Shitshitshitshitshit! Its HOT!"

"Ahh, yes, well that is one effect of the charm," said Lupin nervously, looking sideways at Sierra, "It will be normal in a few minutes."

Iseult rolled her eyes.

"Thank GOD I had the sense to try it out first!"

She chewed her lip for a moment and then frowned. She pulled off her jumper and laid it on the floor.

"Give me your robe, CJ." CJ obliged without question.

In one fluid movement, Iseult pulled off her shirt and slipped on CJ's robe. Thankfully Iseult's skirt and hair were clean.

Remus looked at the slightly yellow shirt she threw down to him. Looking sideways at the door he was thinking; _'James will kill me now. I'm dead. Deeaad!'_ But was too scared of the crazy brunette girl to bolt for the door.

_**Steph**_

Steph was guarding the door, as Sierra and Iseult did not want anyone to see them puking or covered in puke. Outside, pairs of Gryffindors and Slytherins were teaming up to fight each other with fists and words. Suddenly, in the midst of the disarray, a prefect swept into the room. She was a seventh year girl, as far as Steph could tell, and she was wearing a green tie...A Slytherin!

"What's going on?" she demanded in a cold voice.

"Oh shit, Bellatrix." The cute boy, Sirius, paled. Bellatrix turned to face him, and smiled coldly.

"Ahh, my dearest cousin," she said icily. "You must learn to stay out of trouble. Evidently you need tutoring in that subject."

He grinned at her sarcastically, but before he could open his mouth...

"MORRIOS!" hissed his "dearest cousin", spitting the words. Sirius flew through the air, and landed splayed across the floor. Bellatrix smiled.

"I hope, that Gryffindors will stop fighting in the future." She waved at the mangled form of Sirius, and James, who was crouching over him, glared at Bellatrix, horrified.

"Come along, Slytherins. The train is almost at Hogsmeade."

She stalked out of the carriage, the Slytherins trailing behind her.

James, shocked, looked around the compartment. Then, puzzled, he called to Peter; "Wormtail?"

"Yes, James?"

"Wormtail, Where the hell is Moony?"

**_Iseult_**

Remus had finally finished de-puking all Iseult's clothes, and they were waiting for them to cool. Sierra had forbidden to let him go, so he was sitting on the floor, thinking, _'I am gonna die today, die today, die today, I am gonna die today because I didn't fetch James.'_

He was humming along to the words he was singing in his head, and for some reason, it made him feel better.

Sierra had finally got over her puking bout, and was beginning to feel a little better. She was discussing recent events with CJ and Iseult.

"Sierra, why do you reckon that..." Iseult chewed her lip. She was sitting on top of a toilet cubicle, still in CJ's robe. Finally she called out to Remus.

"Remus, what is the arrogant guy with messy hair called?"

Remus chuckled. He wondered what James would say if he had heard that.

"Oh, you mean James?" he said off-handishly Iseult continued.

"Why do you reckon that that James guy didn't punch Snape when he called you...that?"

Sierra herself had been thinking about this. Although the last thing she wanted was to have one of those guys fight for her, James had seemed angry enough with Snape to punch him for any reason.

Remus muttered something from behind his hand. They ignored him.

"And why were they so angry with him anyway?" pointed out CJ.

The girls all shrugged. Remus muttered something again. Sierra sighed heavily.

"Ok, what is it? What are you muttering about?"

"Noth..."

"And don't say 'Nothing'!"

Remus sighed. He may as well tell her. She would probably attack him anyway.

"Sirius was only fighting because James was." (He heard Sierra mumble "typical" under her breath.) "James was fighting Snape because, well, A, Snape is generally an asshole and we all hate him, and B, Snape was..." He nodded in Iseult's direction pointedly. All the girls got the message, but before any argument or enquiry could be made, they head a raised voice at the door.

"What do you mean, I can't come in? My friend is in there!"

Steph, who was still guarding the door, explained.

"WHAT! HES DOING WHAT?"

Steph explained that he was cleaning the puke off Iseult's shirt.

The next moment James Potter burst through the door, only to see CJ, Sierra, and Iseult dressed in only a skirt and a tightly wrapped robe, sitting on top of toilet cubicles, Remus sitting hunched on the floor, and Iseult's robe, jersey and shirt spread out flat on the floor. Understandably, he was a little shocked. He stood there with his mouth open for a few seconds then said, baffled,

"Uh...Remus, can you come outside, Padfoot's hurt."

Remus gingerly stepped outside and shut the door. The girls sat in silence for a moment, then heard a great cry of "OW!" from behind the door.

"Moony! What did you do that for?"

"Well, I knew you would do it to me eventually, so I struck first."

The girls roared in laughter. Iseult and Sierra slapped hands and almost fell off the toilet seats from laughing. After their bout of hysterics was over, Steph called out to them, "The trains stopped guys!"

They all stared at each other wide-eyed. The ensuing panic came quickly, with Iseult and Sierra desperately getting changed VERY fast, and CJ and Steph yelling at them to go faster.

They rushed out of the door, chuckling slightly at the absurdity of the situation, when they suddenly stopped. James, Remus and Peter were huddled around someone, someone who was obviously badly hurt. They crept closer, and when they saw the figure to be Sirius, Sierra gave a little gasp which was covered by Steph's louder one.

"What did it?" asked Iseult nervously.

"A Bitch did it. Shit, if she's killed him I'll kill her..." James was facing away from them, but you could tell how angry he was just from the way he was sitting, so tensely.

Iseult moved forward. She felt responsible. She knew it was because of her that the stupid idiots were fighting in the first place.

"CJ, Steph, can you take our bags to the platform? We'll meet you there soon." Her pleading eyes said it all. They went without complaint.

"Ok, so what spell did it?" said Iseult again, quite fed up with the stupidness of males.

"Oh, she said... Morrios," said the short rat-resembling boy that Iseult now knew was Peter.

"What?" said Sierra, her tone of voice halfway between annoyed and disappointed. She and Iseult looked at each other. They had both been to magical schools where the dark arts were taught.

Iseult pulled out her wand. Sierra grabbed the vase nearby and chucked the flowers to one side. They spoke together-

"One

Two

Three..."

"Surgito!" Iseult cried, just as Sierra tipped the vase of water onto Sirius's head. She leaped back just in time as he abruptly jumped upright into sitting position, very disorientated.

James, Remus and Peter shared pointed looks with each other. They seemed to have suddenly realised that, against their better judgement, they weren't invincible, and there was a chance that these two girls could be better at magic than any of them. A very small chance perhaps, but still a chance.

Before they had time to say anything, the girls were gone. The boys stood up, Sirius stretching out his still limbs. Sirius and James winked at each other. Suddenly, the door burst open. Iseult and Sierra were back.

"This doesn't mean we like you, you know." Said Sierra pointedly.

"We know that's what you were thinking, but your wrong." Iseult alleged.

The boys stared at each other.

Turning to go, Iseult called out "Bye Moony!" as the door shut. Iseult and Sierra waited on the other side of the door just long enough to hear the shout as someone was kicked.

_**Sierra**_

The girls all got off the train along with a large group of others. Sierra and Iseult followed the twins as they made their way towards a row of carriages that were seemingly horseless. They boarded a carriage and sat down, Iseult and Sierra on one side with CJ and Steph on the other (still arguing madly of course). Sierra looked at the view out the window and drifted off a bit, until she realised that the carriage had gone silent and everyone was staring at her…

"Um, Sierra? Is it just me or is that skirt really, really short?"

Sierra blushed, "Its not my fault ok guys?! Danielle insisted that I use her old school uniform – and she was really short!"

Steph and Iseult had almost doubled over laughing and CJ was still staring in awe at Sierra's skirt. Sierra went a rather deep shade of crimson and tugged at her skirt nervously.

"It barely goes up to your thigh!"

"Are you going to do a Marilyn Monroe for us? Coz I don't think anyone really wants to see your undies thanks!"

"I don't know, I think Sirius Black would." Sierra poked her tongue out at Iseult and giggled slightly.

"Well I think we all know what will happen if he tries anything." Everyone laughed except for Stephanie who looked slightly shocked.

"You wouldn't!"

"Oh I think we all know that I would," said Sierra, winking at Stephanie. "Oh come on Steph! I'm not that evil! Although I may look it..." The girls laughed and CJ pulled out a pack of Exploding Snap cards.

"Right then, who want's to play Sex?" Steph and CJ grinned but Iseult and Sierra exchanged nervous glances.

"Uhh, CJ?" asked Iseult nervously "What does 'Sex' involve?" CJ saw the apprehension on the two girls faces and giggled.

"well, 'Sex' is just snap."

"Except you scream out SEX instead of SNAP!" explained Steph.

"Precisely."

"Oh," said Sierra "I think I understand it. So it's just a dirty version of Snap?"

"Pretty much."

"In that case, deal away!" said Iseult happily. The girls chatted and played 'Sex' for the whole journey. It was actually quite fun once you got competitive and people started accusing each other of cheating. It wasn't long however, before CJ and Steph began arguing noisily. Sierra decided to just ignore them and turned to Iseult.

"What school did you go to before you came here?"

"Oh, just a little school really. You wouldn't have heard of it."

"Well, not many people have heard of Tora either."

"Yeah, but I'd prefer not to talk about it." She shuffled uncomfortably in her seat and Sierra decided to drop it.

"What house do you think you're going to be in?" Iseult brightened considerably.

"Oh I'm pretty sure I'll be in Ravenclaw. I got top marks in most of my exams last year. Do you know how they get sorted?" Sierra nodded glumly.

"Tristan says that there's a hat."

"A hat?" said Iseult sceptically with one eyebrow raised. Sierra shrugged.

"No idea. Justin says that it bites you then your put into a house by how loud you scream. But then Danielle hit him with her Transfiguration book and told him not to be a nasty prick. So I'm kinda lost too."

"Justin sounds like a dick." Said Iseult mildly.

"He is." Sierra agreed, "But he's really good at talking his way out of things. If I had a sickle for everytime he talked his way out of trouble with Danielle... I would be one hell of a rich witch."

They laughed then Iseult glanced at the twins (who were still arguing), leaned forward and whispered to Sierra,

"Is it just me, or do you think its about time they were broken up?" the two girls grinned evilly at each other and pulled out their wands.

"AQUANIUS PROSURTIS!" they shouted together. The two arguing girls were instantly drenched in a stream of water that exploded out of the tips of their wands. CJ slowly turned to Sierra and Iseult with a look of extreme indignation on her face. Sierra and Iseult burst into loud laughter and Sierra almost collapsed onto the seat.

"That was not very nice." Said CJ, thumping Steph on the back so that she spit out the water she had accidentally swallowed.

"s-s-sorry!" stuttered Sierra between fits of laughter. Iseult wasn't even bothering to say anything she was laughing too hard. The twins sat in indignant silence for the rest of the ride, while Sierra and Iseult tried to control their laughter.

By the time the carriages stopped the two girls were still giggling uncontrollably. Steph shot them a look of pure hate and stalked off towards the entrance of a giant castle. CJ waved goodbye and followed her inside. Iseult turned to Sierra.

"So, do you have any idea where we're supposed to be now?"

"uh..." Sierra started, but was cut off by a strict looking woman who was pushing her way towards them.

"You girls were supposed to have come in with Hagrid!"

"Oh, uh, sorry! But we followed some other girls here and we..." Iseult drifted of, smiling nervously at the stern woman.

"Well then, come on!" She ushered them inside towards a group of scared- looking first years.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** On the off chance that anyone is actually reading this... Please review! Even if its just to say you read it and hated it, loved it, had no real opinion on it. Constructive critisim would be great, but at the moment I'd just like anything! Three chapters and not one review, pitiful!!

**_DISCLAIMER:_** I own nothing. I'm not even going to claim the characters I made up, I doubt anyone would want to steal them.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five: Sorting out the Dirty Laundry**

**_Iseult_**

Iseult was slightly shocked. They were to be sorted with the first years!!!! AHHHHH!!! She voiced her disgust to Sierra, but the stern lady glared at them and Sierra merely gulped, and pointed at the stool on the platform that they were obviously going to have to sit on. A very high stool in plain view of the whole school. And with Sierra's skirt...

"Shuddup." Mumbled Sierra miserably. Iseult was having a laughing fit. She only stopped when the stern lady glared at her again.

They were waiting just outside the doors of the main hall. Dumbledore had not yet arrived, and so the fidgeting first years and two third years were waiting patiently for their tardy headmaster to turn up.

Out of the blue, a tall, slightly sunburnt blonde boy ran backwards into the room, evidently waving at someone outside. He continued running backwards until he was stopped by an obstruction-Iseult. He was running very fast, and Iseult fell over. So did he.

To cut a long story short the two of them ended up in a heap on the stone floor. Iseult had landed face down, and her chin had procured substantial bruising. She groaned, while Sierra attempted to stifle her laughter. Half the first years were giggling too.

The boy on top of her stood up abruptly. His face was even redder now than the sunburn had ever made it, and he bent down to help Iseult up. Iseult was do dazed from the fall and too aware of the teacher to have a go at him, although she dearly wanted to kick him for making her look so stupid in front of all these people. Instead she just glared at him angrily. She could tell Sierra was doing the same behind her, and felt greatly supported. Evidently the boy was blind as well as clumsy, because he seemed to take their scowls for smiles, and introduced himself.

"I'm Alessandro Corbeau. Sorry bout that, tripping over you before; I was waving to the gamekeeper." He blushed again, closely resembling a blonde tomato.

Iseult felt that a welcome like this could hardly be met with a scowl. At least he apologised, she reasoned.

"Oh. Hi, I'm Iseult, This is Sierra. Its...don't worry about it."

The teacher coughed. Verrrry Slowly, Alessandro turned around.

"I..." he started. Apparently the teacher didn't care.

"Yes, Yes," she tutted. "I know. Now sit down at that table before I start to care!"

See, I told you she didn't care. Anyway...

Alessandro apologised again, and quickly swept through the door to alight on one of the benches surrounding the Gryffindor table. Suddenly, the mass of first and third years started briskly moving forward. Iseult and Sierra walked in with the rest of them, admiring the astonishingly beautiful great hall. Incredibly gothic, the whole huge place seemed to be carved of one block of stone. Flutes and arches decorated the walls, while strangely happy gargoyles were waving at the students. Iseult was admiring the floor when...

She looked up. At the most amazing ceiling she had ever seen. At the far ends of the hall, the sun was setting. Ripples of pink, red, orange and gold slowly faded into a strip of colour akin to green, and then into a deepest, darkest blue. Iseult had read and heard about this ceiling before, but she had imagined a glass-roof effect. This was like an omnipotent God had taken the evening sky, with all it's clouds and winds and colours, and placed it inside the precincts of the roof of the great hall. It was an astounding sight.

The group of newcomers shuffled forward nervously, all aware that the whole school was staring at them. Over the heads of the first years, (little- wittwle firwst wearws) Iseult could see the lined face of Albus Dumbledore, the headmaster. His hands rested on his bony fingers, but his eyes were bright and sparkling as he gazed over his newest charges. Gathered in a huddle at the head of the hall, were the apprehensive group waited for the teacher to explain the sorting ceremony. But she didn't. Just as the first name was about to be called, a very scared first-year called out quietly,

"What do we have to do?"

The teacher, for whom the sorting ceremony was ritual, looked slightly taken aback. In the end, she sighed, comforting the child by explaining in motherly fashion,

"Just put the hat on dear. Sit on the stool and put on the hat."

The first child, a chubby first year boy, walked up to the stool tensely, gazed around at his audience, and sat on the stool, his pudgy knees wobbling. It was tough being first. The teacher picked up the sorting hat from off its pedestal, and placed it on the boy's head. He must have been told a similar story as Sierra about biting hats, because he screwed up his face, as if waiting for a great deal of pain. This, however, never came. Instead, the hat was the one who screamed.

"HUFFLEPUFF!" yelled the hat, louder than you would think possible for something created by a milliner, albeit a magical one. The pudgy boy skipped off down to the Hufflepuff table, who were applauding wildly.

After this successful sorting came a stream of apprehensive first years. Antoinette Barboutiss, Xerxes Bennett, Maximillian Bolle, Neil Diamant, Mimi Effek, Adam Eva, Orwin Fowl, George Haberdeen, Asher Juile, Violet Le Hall, Amanda Miller and Coco Pavara all followed after the first boy, Tommy Aguare, as well as many others. After what was most definitely an age, came the two third years.

The name "Peregrine, Iseult" echoed through the great hall.

Iseult trod up the steps and along the platform to sit on the stool.

_'I'm glad I don't have Sierra's skirt on.'_ She could feel the weight of the hat on her head. It was surprisingly heavy.

_'Maybe it has a real brain inside it?'_ Iseult pondered, waiting for the magic of the hat to kick in. It seemed to have been almost half a minute since she had sat down on the stool. It hadn't taken this long for the other students.

_"Time passes differently when I'm on your head,"_ said a voice in Iseult's head. It was the hat! Iseult smiled. _'So this was how it worked. The hat was a mind reader!'_

_"More of a mind-analyser really,"_ said the hat. "_You supply what is in your head, and I analyse it. You have to give me the right bits to analyse of course. When that Aguare boy put me on, he told me that he was terrified of school, and that he thought I looked too old. Now that is NOT the right thing to do."_

_"So, How am I supposed to show you things?"_ Iseult said...or thought. She wasn't sure which.

_"Just think them, run them through your head, that is how everyone else does it." _

Ok... Iseult had no idea of what house she should be in, as long as it wasn't Slytherin, with the Snape boy, she was happy.

So, without being biased towards any particular house, she ran through all that was in her head. All that had happened that day, that week. From saying good-bye to her mother, her sisters, her brother, her cousins, to all that had happened today, to her joy at being at Hogwarts finally, to her anticipation to learn more magic. When she felt that she had sufficiently emptied her mind, the hat paused, then said,

_"Carry on, I haven't got enough, and you are a very mixed bag. I'm not psychic you know. Oh, wait...I am. Continue anyway!"_

So Iseult searched in her mind, and emptied out her store of memories. Memories from when she was a baby, her father picking her up and her mother cuddling her. Memories of from when she was a child, holidays on her parent's estate in France, running through the olive groves and being chased by her dear brother through the rows of vineyards. And one time, a time from when she was a little girl. When she cried because she couldn't fly like the falcons that soured above the hills and the mountains. She tried to jump off a small cliff, so that she could take to the air as the birds did. Her magical ability took hold and Iseult soured like a bird all the way down to the herb garden where her mother and grandmother were resting.

"I flew, Grandmere! I flew!" she cried to her astonished muggle grandmother.

"Bless the Lord!" exclaimed Iseult's loving Italian grandmother. "My little dove has become an eagle!"

_"Ahah!"_ Yelled the hat in Iseult's ear. _"That's it! I have it! Now, let me tell you how I have analysed your mind, or the parts of it you have offered me anyway."_

Iseult, dazed from being pulled back to the present so quickly, nodded naively.

_"Now, any untrained hat half as wise as me would think that that whole flight memory skit symbolises you striving to reach new heights, being ambitious, a quality that would land you in Slytherin. However..."_

_"Yay!"_ thought Iseult. _"I'm not in Slytherin!!!"_

_"...That was what I thought you would think. As I was saying, To any untrained hat you would seem the perfect Slytherin. However, as your grandmother says, you are a dove, gentle and caring, but can also be an eagle, the bravest and strongest of mortal birds. Plus, you put so much emphasis on your family, your home, you are honest, loyal..."_ The hat realised that Iseult wanted to get off the chair and down to her table. _"So, without any further ado, I sort Iseult Peregrine as a ..._GRYFFINDOR!!!!!"

Iseult grinned and took of the hat. As she handed it back, it said quietly, _"Come visit me in Dumbledore's office one time. I'm quite lonely most of the year."_

The Gryffindor table was clapping wildly. Iseult was grinning and feeling very much more valuable after the Sorting hat's appraisals. As she descended the steps she looked for empty seats on the Gryffindor table. Coming closer, she saw that STUPID JAMES POTTER move across to make space as she came near, but she walked right past him. Finally, on the opposite side of the table from James, she saw Alessandro. He grinned at her when she gestured to the seat. Iseult sighed.

_'Oh well. At least he's friendly, although definitely unusual...'_

"It's your friend now." Alessandro nodded to Sierra, the girl in the tiny skirt who was stepping up to the stool.

_**Sierra**_

Sierra had managed to get herself into quite a few embarrassing situations in her time. When a seventh year at her old school had jinxed Sierra to not be able to say anything apart from sexual innuendos (it was the seventh year's leaving day – the pranks were flowing fast and free) during the first years speech competitions she hadn't had the courage to return to school for a week afterwards.

As Sierra walked towards the sorting hat infront of all these people, she tried to think which was more embarrassing: telling the principal of Tora Academy that he was a sex god, or this.

A generous portion of the school was tittering loudly at the size of her skirt. One or two students wolf-whistled (Sierra was certain she could hear Sirius). She turned a violent shade of magenta and put the hat on, trying to bring it over her eyes.

_"There's no need to feel embarrassed you know,"_ a voice said into her ear, _"By the time the feast gets underway no one will remember it."_

Sierra sat up straight and let out a little mental eep!

_"No need to fret! I'm just going to have a poke around your head to find out your appropriate house."_

_'You're a psychic hat?'_ Thought Sierra miserably.

_"To some extent. Now please be quiet and let me have a look!"_ Sierra sat silently as the hat muttered some stuff into her ear.

_'Mental hat,'_ she thought.

_"I heard that."_

_'Oh, sorry.'_

_"I have half a mind to put you in Slytherin you know, from what I can see you'd hate that."_

'_Only 'coz that git Snape is in it.'_

_"Ah, well then best to put you in…_ GRIFFINDOR"

Sierra sighed happily and walked towards Iseult and Alesandro, who were waving at her and beaming happily. CJ and Stephanie also smiled and waved, although they were at the Ravenclaw table next to them. She ignored all the ogling looks her skirt got from the various testosterone-filled males in the hall and made a silent vow that next year she would be investing in a very long skirt. She sat down next to Iseult and put her head in her hands.

"I am going to kill Justin for making me wear this." She groaned into her hands, "People are still staring at me."

"Oh that's just because it rides up a bit at your arse!" said Alesandro brightly. Sierra shot him a dark look.

"I have a big arse!" she wailed loudly "I have a big arse, a short skirt and evil brothers. My life is hell!"

Iseult giggled, then gave Sierra a serious look "Ok, one; you don't have a big arse. Two; yes, your skirt is short but there's nothing you can do about it right now and its not that big a deal. Three; I don't know your brothers so therefore I can't comment on them, but I'm sure they're not as bad as you insist."

"Oh yes they are! When I was five Justin told me that there was a werewolf under my bed and that it was waiting to bite me!"

Alesandro began to say something but he was cut off (much to the relief of Iseult, she knew he was going to say something thoroughly un-helpful) by the golden plates in front of them filling up with food. He was instantly distracted and began piling his plate up with various foods, grinning like a madman. Sierra daintily piled a few chicken legs onto her plate along with some peas and mashed potato. Iseult was poking something nervously with her fork, before pushing it to the side of her plate with a look of pure disgust.

It wasn't long (well, time flies when you're having fun doesn't it?) before everyone had eaten their fill and Professor Dumbledore had given the customary start of year notes. Sierra, Iseult and Alesandro followed the new Gryffindor prefects (Justice Monroe and Jason Belch) up to the portrait of a rather large lady in a pink dress. Sierra was reminded with a jolt of her bottom and sub-consciously pulled the back of her skirt down a bit. Iseult started giggling and pointed behind Sierra, who looked around and saw James Potter lying on the ground tangled some what precariously along with a suit of armour. Sierra joined Iseult in her giggling fit and promptly stepped back onto Alesandro who screamed in pain.

"Ouch! Those heels hurt Sierra! Jeez, warn me before you try to stab me in the foot."

"Sorry Alesandro! I was too busy laughing at, what was that charming name you called him before Iseult? Ah yes, I was too busy laughing at that stuck up prick with the hair to notice that you were standing a few inches from my arse."

"And a very nice one it is too I notice."

"Unlike yours, Black." Quipped Iseult.

The trio stepped into the portrait hole. Sierra looked around in awe.

"Wow! The common rooms weren't like this at Tora!"

Fires were roaring in the grates at either end of the red and gold decorated room. Comfy sofas and chairs were scattered all around the room, along with a few tables thrown in to encourage students to actually participate in homework once in a while. It seemed that Iseult was just as awe-struck as Sierra, as her mouth was hanging and her eyes were wide.

"So, um, where are we supposed to go?" she asked Sierra. Alessandro pointed towards a staircase winding upwards from the right hand corner of the room.

"That's where the girls dorm's are. You'll find your rooms up there, its not hard. It says 'Third Years' on the door."

"Thanks Alessandro!" said Sierra warmly, giving him a peck on the cheek. "Quel du!"

Alessandro looked confused.

"What's 'Quel du' mean?"

"Its elvish," Iseult explained "for 'Good Night'. I didn't know you spoke elvish Sierra?"

"Only a little, Danielle keeps trying to teach me. But I truly suck at languages." The pair laughed and headed towards the girls dormitories, as Alessandro headed towards the boys. Climbing the stairs, Sierra noticed a number of interesting pictures, and wondered vaguely what had happened to her trunk that she had left in the entrance hall. They found the room that said 'Third Years' with surprising ease and entered rather hesitantly. Inside, chatting happily were two girls. The girls turned as Sierra and Iseult entered and beamed at them. The first girl had curly long red hair and hazel eyes, the second had a short black page-boy cut with striking green eyes. The red head stood up and offered a hand to Iseult.

"Hey! You must be the new girls. Glad to meet you, I'm Ginger. Ginger O'Rourke and this here," she gestured towards the other girl, who was waving in a bored fashion "is Trinity Russe."

"Oh," said Iseult nervously "I'm Iseult Peregrine and this is Sierra Rehine."

"Rain? That's a funny name." Said Trinity abruptly.

"Its not Rain, it's pronounced that way but its really spelt Ray-heen-ay"

"Ok then." Said Trinity with no apparent interest whatsoever. She stood up and walked out of the dorm. Sierra stared after her, mouth agape.

"Is she always that rude?"

Ginger smiled apologetically. "No. Well… yes. But she's nice when you get to know her. Just a little crabby sometimes."

_**Iseult**_

Iseult was gazing out the window up by the end of her bed. Everyone had a wide silled window and small alcove to themselves, as well as a chair and wardrobe which sat in the sunny warmth of Iseult's alcove. She was not listening to Ginger's reply. Ginger! Iseult pitied the poor girl immensely. What kind parent with any sense at all would call their daughter Ginger? ESPECIALLY if it is pretty obvious that they are going to have red hair. Iseult ran her hand through her own almost but not quite resembling strawberry blonde hair. Imagine if she had been called Blondie! She chuckled at the thought.

Iseult drifted over to Sierra, who was obviously equally interested in the view out her window. Sierra turned and grinned.

"Up for a bit of exploring the castle? We're free until eight," asked Iseult, wanting to get away from Trinity and Ginger's chatter. Sierra nodded, and the two girls slipped on their robes.

"Isn't Alessandro gorgeous?" Sierra said as they skipped down the spiral stairs.

"Yes! I knew he would be!" Laughed Iseult. "Politically incorrect in many ways, but gorgeous. I thought you didn't like him at first?"

Sierra shrugged absentmindedly. Iseult was quite amazed that she and Sierra had not even known each other for a day, but already were talking like old friends.

The two girls arrived in the comm. Vividly decorated with red and gold tapestries, It was extremely cosy, and reminded Iseult of a little après-ski hotels in France that she had stayed at with her parents once.

"Can we go into the boy's dorms?"

Iseult looked at Sierra puzzledly as her friend said this. But then her eyes widened, and you could almost hear her brain go 'click'.

"Ahhh. Alessandro. Riiight... I dunno." Iseult said, blushing.

Her friend chuckled. "Blonde moment?" Sierra asked as Iseult poked out her tongue. She continued, "We may as well go up and knock, see if he'll come around with us. We'll get lost otherwise."

Iseult nodded, slightly embarrassed, but then laughed. "As long as I get to be the one to tell that stuck-up prick that we aren't looking for him." Sierra laughed, but reluctantly agreed.

Up the opposite set of stairs they went, and knocked on the "third years" dorm door. Iseult called out, "Its Iseult and Sierra!"

Just as predicted, a slightly flustered James Potter appeared at the door almost immediately, followed by a more relaxed Sirius, who said very coolly, "How are you ladies this evening?"

Iseult pretended not to feel incredibly cruel and chimed brightly,

"Oh we're great thanks! Hey, can we come in?"

The boys, evidently, couldn't believe their luck, and invited them in to the dorm, where a handful of boys were playing some form of wizarding poker around a low table.

The boy's rooms were almost identical to the girls' dorms in many ways, with five four-poster beds against the wall of the round tower, dotted with small alcoves. Couches and tables were scattered in the centre of the room, and one long skylight giving a view of the deep blue twilight sky. The difference between the two rooms, taking into consideration that Iseult and Sierra had only just arrived, were the decorations. Quidditch, football and snowboarding posters covered the walls, comics covered the floors (but Iseult saw Sirius kicking a "Play wizard" under his bed) and "Imp Hexed and the Warlocks" was playing at full blast on the wireless.

"So, do you girls want a tour of the castle?" clamoured Sirius. James looked hopeful, and Remus snickered beside him.

"Sure," Sierra shrugged. "In fact, Alessandro, what would you say to a walk around the castle? Show us around?"

"Ok!" cried Alessandro, grinning like a madman. The boys playing cards were by now all watching. Iseult gazed around, smiling cheekily. "Great, lets go then."

As Alessandro was tugging his shoes on, Iseult caught Remus's eye. He smirked back at her.

"Kick James for me!" Iseult mouthed, looking sideways in 'That stuck up prick's' direction. Remus gagged slightly as he tried not to laugh.

Finally Alessandro had his boots on and the trio were ready to leave. As they swept out, Iseult had to restrain herself from screaming out "Bye Remus!" and listening for the scream as someone was kicked. You are so cruel! Iseult told herself. Oh, yes, but I like being cruel. She grinned. Evilly.

They descended the spiral stairs in single file.

"So, why did you guys pulled me outa there?" asked Alessandro at last. "Not that I mind, of course."

"It's just like I said, we want to have a look around the castle without getting lost."

"And get away from a few people," added Iseult

"Although I could probably navigate the school with everything Tristan and Justin have told me."

Navigating around the busyness and furniture of the comm, the trio found the entrance, pushed open the fat lady's portrait and clambered through.

"Where to?" Alessandro combed his fringe back with his fingers. Iseult realised what she was too busy tripping over to notice before; that in his own way, Alessandro was good looking. His stripe of red sunburn across his cheeks was obviously from a summer holiday on the beach somewhere.

"Where did you holiday? To get this?" Iseult touched the burn lightly, but he still flinched.

"South of Amalfi. My Dad has a place there. I spent way too much time in the sun this holidays."

Iseult gasped, beaming.

"Amalfi! Oh my God! You are so lucky! I love the coast down there!"

"Are you Italian, Alessandro?" Sierra asked lightly. Alessandro smiled shyly.

"Well, yeah, my Dad is. Mum's English though so that's why I'm going here rather than some Italian school. And call me Aless or Alesk or something, k?"

"Aless, Ok."

"So where are you guys from? England or Wales or where?"

Iseult choked briefly but recovered to say,

"I'm like you I think. Spend the school year here, Go back home to France in July, and spend holidays at grandparent's house in Tuscany."

"You're French?" said Sierra and Alessandro at once. They had reason to be surprised. Based on stereotypes, Iseult was amazingly un-French like.

"Well, No! My Parents are both Italian-born English, but they own an estate in France, well; it's like a glorified farm really, where we have vines and a few orchards. My heart is closer to Italy really. I don't like England. Bloody cold.

The other two nodded, both dreaming of a sunny holiday on a French vineyard estate. Sierra shivered, noticing how cold it was, but added her origins to the mix.

"Thailand. Although my parents were both English. But we moved to London when Tristan started school."

"Wow, exotic." Aless grinned.

All this time they had been steadily plodding down the multiple staircases, and now found themselves in the marble atrium by the great hall, where Iseult had, not that long ago found herself face down on the marble floor, and where they had first caught a glimpse of the magnificent ceiling of the great hall. Iseult rubbed her bruised chin reminiscently, glaring at Aless, who was gazing through the space between the double staircases, up into the far above rafters of Hogwarts. She looked around for Sierra, who had already slunk over to the open door. As Iseult walked towards her, she turned and grinned mischievously, beckoning and gesturing at something outside. Iseult reached the door, and looked in the direction Sierra was pointing. Pling. (They struck the same train of thought.) Iseult couldn't help grinning.

"Acio, swimming togs!" she called. Sierra rolled her eyes. Iseult laughed.

"Well, I'm not skinny-dipping!" and she skipped back into the atrium, to drag Alessandro outside.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** I'd like to thank anyone who actually paid any attention to my last Authors Note and reviewed. I'm really grateful that you took the time to jot me down a little review so big thanks to you! And again, please review. Even if you just want to say "I like the part when does and says HA!" or "I think you're a sucky writer."

**_DISCLAIMER: _**I own nothing. I'm not even going to claim the characters I made up, I doubt anyone would want to steal them


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six: The Hogwarts Ghosts**

_**Sierra**_

The swim in the lake hadn't taken more than half an hour. Neither of the girls could handle the freezing temperatures for very long. Aless hadn't bothered to even get in the water, claiming that he didn't want to get eaten by the giant squid. Sierra had been slightly alarmed at the prospect, but Iseult looked like all her christmasses had come at once.

After they dried off they allowed Alessandro to lead them around the parts of the grounds that were still light. He was a surprisingly good host, and Sierra found herself admiring his knowledge of his school. Any questions the girls had Alessandro answered, and before long they found themselves back in the common room, giggling about Alessandro's stories of peeves.

"This one time he was rolling cauldrons down the dungeons' stairs, all the Slytherins went nuts, it was great!" he recounted cheerfully as the girls laughed around him

Justice Monroe gave them a seething look and said loudly,

"If you're going to make such a racket then you better get up to your dormotories. Some of us here are actually trying to WORK."

Sierra and Iseult, still giggling, bid farewell to Aless who made his way back up to the boy's dorms. Still laughing madly they collapsed into their dorm room and fell onto their beds. Ginger and Trinity, who had been playing cards at the time, looked at them strangely. Trinity stood up and put her hands on her hips, narrowing her eyes, taking on a look rather like that of Snape's.

"Why the hell did you just come charging in here breaking the peace? And where have you BEEN for all this time?" Sierra and Iseult stopped giggling and looked at Trinity with expressions of disbelief plastered on their faces. Sierra was just about to say something when Ginger put a comforting hand on Trinity's shoulder.

"Look Trin, don't blame them. It's not their fault." She said softly.

"Yeah, well if they just come in and take over Ezrai and Tainia's places then they can just piss the hell off." Shouted Trinity. Sierra glanced at Iseult and saw the shock on her face that was mirrored on her own.

Ginger sighed,

"Look Trin, they have no idea ok? They're not trying to intrude. Come on, let's go for a walk shall we?" She pushed Trinity gently out of the room. Trinity shot one last seething look at Iseult and Sierra before exiting in front of Ginger, who mouthed 'I'll explain later' after her. The door shut with a soft 'thud' and Sierra looked at Iseult, who had her mouth wide open.

"Well, that was certainly unexpected wasn't it!" she said.

"I wonder what bought that about?"

"No idea, but I think it was something to do with someone called Ezrai and Tainia..."

"Do you know who they are?" asked Sierra.

"No idea." Sierra shrugged, making her way to her trunk and pulling out a framed picture of her family, which she placed lovingly on the shelf next to her bed. "But I'm getting unpacked now. Hopefully when she gets back we can pretend we're asleep…"

_**Iseult**_

The lights out bell rung just as the girls finished unpacking. Sierra and Iseult changed hurriedly, and thank GOD, Sierra's pyjamas actually covered her stomach and thighs. Iseult's slightly frilly night robe looked like an antique, so she pulled a pair of muggle pyjamas out of her trunk. They were pale pink and covered in smiling cows. _'Thank God these are muggle-made, or I'd be mooing all night.'_ Iseult smiled to herself.

"In bed already?" asked Trinity snootily, as she and Ginger swept in the door.

The girls crept between their linen sheets and ignored Trinity's haughty whispers behind them, which was intelligent as Prof. Byre, McGonagall's "second in command" thumped in a second later, wearing huge army boots that seemed to be iron-soled, they made such a loud noise. She was not a subtle person. She liked loud noises. In fact, Professor Byre's secret dream was to start up a magical fireworks factory in southern France...In the meantime she had to be content with shouting at excited kids.

"GET INTO BED NOW! WHY ARE YOU NOT IN BED? I WILL SEND AN OWL TO YOUR PARENTS! DETENTIONS FOR ALL OF YOU"

Then she slammed the door. She shouted the same thing at every door, whether they were dutifully asleep or partying on their beds. She just liked shouting, you see. Trinity and Ginge dutifully ignored her therefore, and took their time getting into bed.

It was midnight. Iseult lay in the dark listening to the wind whistling through the stone buttresses, an unearthly sound alike to a woman wailing. She sat up abruptly and brushed aside the curtains of the bed to stand, arms crossed, by the window. Straining her eyes through the grey-blue half- light of a castle glowing with magic, she imagined snow-white, wisp-like shapes swirling in and out of the arched buttresses.

Iseult's back prickled, and she swung around, not really expecting to see anything more than the quiet dorm room. Instead a pale wraithlike figure in a white dress was looking sadly over her shoulder. What... stammered Iseult, mouthing but not having the energy to speak the words. She expected one of the famous Hogwarts ghosts, but soon realised that the pale-faced, dark haired girl was a slightly groggy Trinity, who was gazing over Iseult's shoulder torpidly.

"I..." started Iseult hesitantly, gesturing vaguely at the window. But Trinity pointed back, at the solid buttresses supporting the base of the tower.

"They are the ghosts." She whispered. A single tear trickled from each eye, down her cheek and into the hollow of her neck. Iseult stepped forward and gripped her icy-cold hand with the finger extended in the direction of Iseult's imaginary spirits. Trinity pulled away and staggered towards the window. A soft, low cry emitted from her lungs, echoing in Iseult's ears. Suddenly a figure from behind Iseult leapt forward and grabbed Trinity's arm, just in time to catch her as she fainted and collapsed. As the person turned and flipped her hair, Iseult saw a hint of auburn hair, and instantly recognised Sierra, who was now dragging Trinity across the floor. Iseult helped lift her back into her bed. Because although conscious again, Trinity was beyond walking. She tucked herself into bed though, leaving Iseult to shrug away Sierra's questions and clamber into her own bed.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** Sorry for the short, crap chapter, I know not many people bother to read this fic because of length, but I'll put up the next one as soon as I get a review. And the next one's good (honest)...

**_DISCLAIMER:_** Don't own anything.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven: "I Could Have Missed the Pain But I would of had to Miss the Dance"  
**

_**Iseult**_

A grinning Alessandro greeted the girls at the breakfast table down in the great hall, where they recounted Trinity's strangeness the previous night. He was more or less indifferent.

"Yeah, Trins pretty crazy. She has lots of weird ideas. Brilliant Quidditch player though. Great with a quaffle." He gulped down a glass of pumpkin juice.

"So who are Ezrai and Tania?" Sierra was questioning Aless to the point of interrogation. He was about to open his mouth when Iseult squealed "Yay! Porridge!" and ladled a ton of hot porridge into her bowl, before drizzling it with milk and brown sugar. Nonplussed, Aless continued,

"The two girls that you're replacing. I didn't even know it was them who had gone. Ezralia's twin brother's left too, I presume the family's moved."

Iseult had finished her porridge and now looked disappointedly at her empty bowl. She saw a rack of toast near Aless, and reached over him to grab a piece.

"You have amazing metabolism, did you know that?" Aless watched her chew her honey-drenched toast delicately.

"I know. And exquisite table manners." She grinned. "And I'm just so modest!"

A sudden thump from the head table silenced them. Professor Albus Dumbledore, apparently still chewing, stood up and boomed out, amazingly for a man of his age and apparent frailty,

"Tonight, students, as you will all be aware of, at precisely 6'O One, is the Third year to Fifth year...dance."

Sierra, rather too loudly, remarked, "It is?" in a slightly horrified fashion, looking sideways at Sirius, who was beaming at her mischievously.

Iseult's mind had left her breakfast and was now settling firmly on one thing. That thing was: HOLYSHITWATAMIGOINGTOWEARIDONTHAVEBLOODYDRESSROBES. Dumbledore apparently noticed some of the new student's distress, as he happily added,

"This year I have decided we will break with tradition and wear our casual, normal clothes! No dress robes necessarily!" This comment brightened the student's faces but the teachers looked very disappointed and solemn. Iseult noticed Professor Byre shoot a sharp look in Sierra's direction and mumble something to McGonagall which looked suspiciously like "Bare thighs and midriffs". The headmaster ignored this.

"As you will also have noticed by now, Today is a SATURDAY, and therefore you have today and tomorrow off so that you can organize yourself for school. Although we don't actually expect you to do that of course." Dumbledore grinned, and dismissed the students from the great hall, which was canopied with a smiling sky.

_**Sierra**_

Dear god this was boring. Sierra usually loved dances and the type, but for some reason she just felt, well, out of it all.

Iseult, Ginger and Sierra had spent most of the evening making each other over. It hadn't taken much to turn Ginger into somewhat of a goddess. She was wearing a sparkly green tank top and maroon pants that ended in a bootleg. Sierra would never have imagined these colours paired together, but somehow Ginger pulled it off. The green eye shadow went beautifully with her eyes and top, and her hair hung long down her back with a couple of silver clips in it. Iseult looked almost as gorgeous in an almost too- tight top printed in some Italian passage that Sierra couldn't read but was sure many guys would be happy to translate, and a slightly "puffy" white skirt wrapped in ribbons. Her strawberry blonde hair was done up in a messy bun, with a few wisps of hair framing her face at the sides. She wasn't wearing much makeup except for some mascara that lengthened her eyelashes in a striking way, a bit of light pink sparkly lip-gloss and a touch of eye shadow. Trinity hadn't taken part in this make up fest, she had just grabbed a makeup bag from her trunk and gone to the bathroom, only talking to Ginger. A few minutes later she had returned. She was wearing heavy eyeliner and mascara, and a deep red shade of lipstick. She looked absolutely gorgeous in a kind of goth-chick way. All this Trinity had teamed up with a tiny black spaghetti-strap dress.

When they had finally got into the Great Hall (ten minutes late, naturally) Ginger had gone off to her Hufflepuff boyfriend. So Sierra and Iseult giggled between themselves over who was wearing the most atrocious outfit. A 4th year with pink hair won, just in case you were wondering. Iseult had then gone to get them some drinks, when she was asked to dance by a Ravenclaw boy with deep gold hair. Which was why Sierra was standing with CJ and Steph. Steph nudged her and pointed over to where the male Gryffindor third years were standing.

"Sirius Black is looking at you." She said excitedly. Sierra resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She just couldn't understand the kind of girls who just stood around all day gossiping over who liked who and whether they were an item or not.

"Well actually," pointed out CJ "He's looking at her ass. He's been staring at it for the past five minutes." This time Sierra actually did roll her eyes.

"Don't guys have anything better to do?"

"No." said CJ blandly, "They spend their whole lives staring at girls. It's a proven fact that if every woman in the world walked around naked female's would rule the world." Sierra laughed, both at CJ's comments and the astounded look on Steph's face.

"God, I would DIE to have Sirius Black stare at my ass like that." She said dreamily. "I don't know what you're complaining about personally. Him and that James Potter are the best-looking guys at Hogwarts by far." CJ rolled her eyes and ignored her sister.

"Sierra, ignore Steph. Sirius Black has the worst reputation at Hogwarts. He's a complete tosser. He goes out with girls then dumps them the next week. Trust me, you're better off just ignoring the idiot." Steph was about to say something, but she was cut off by Iseult drifting back towards them. Steph was instantly distracted and started firing questions at Iseult about the boy from Ravenclaw.

_**Iseult**_

"That was Daniel Jones, wasn't it? The forth year you were dancing with?"

"Well, I thought his name was David, actually..."

"Was he nice? Why did you stop dancing with him?"

"Oh, well..." Iseult was being bombarded by questions from Steph about the boy she had just danced with. Sierra and CJ were standing smirking behind Iseult's assailant, apparently quite happy to leave Iseult helpless to Steph's questioning. "He was nice, not very interesting. He looked like he was a bit scared to talk. I don't know why..."

Steph sniggered obviously. Iseult stopped herself from blurting out 'What?' as it would just make Steph happier. Rolling her eyes, Steph put her hand on her hip.

"I know why he was scared." Steph rolled the 'I'. Is it even possible to roll your 'I's? Maybe it was a talent that came from being absolutely and utterly boy mad. CJ decided that it was time to save Iseult from Steph.

"Hey, look, the school band's starting! Why don't we head closer to the stage?"

During the course of the day the prefects and gamekeeper had turned the area where the teachers usually sat into a makeshift stage. The four girls shuffled through the throng of people so that they were in the midst of a gaggle of students surrounding the curtained stage, Steph reluctantly because it took away her chance to blabber on about James Potter. As the music started to play, the sea of shuffling feet stilled, and they stopped to listen to the notes of a band...who did not write their own music, evidently...

"...The heart is a bloom,

Shoots up through the stony ground,

There's no room,

No space to rent in this town..."

Iseult, who had been listening to muggle radio stations playing U2 all summer holidays, groaned slightly. At least it's a good song. The initial awe of the soon music died down, and people started dancing again. Iseult, Sierra, CJ and Steph were about to go and get another drink when CJ hissed,

"Dickheads, three O'clock!"

Sierra and Iseult groaned and turned, thoroughly sick of playing cat and mouse with these boys. Steph licked her lips nervously. She had not given up her hopes yet.

"Quick!" hissed Sierra. "Set me up with someone to dance with! Shit! Hurry up!!!"

CJ grabbed Alessandro, who just happened to be the nearest guy, and flung him, flabbergasted into Sierra, who was thankful to have an excuse to be away from Sirius while Iseult was left helpless as James bounded up to her.

Iseult looked to the ethereal ceiling in despair. Shit. Not him. Exasperated, Iseult muttered aloud in an undertone, unheard by all but Steph who was moping wishfully beside her.

"Has he not realised yet that I don't care about him?"

Steph's whole face lit up, and for a second Iseult felt genuinely sorry for her. "Really? You...you don't like him even the tiniest bit...?" she whispered as the being in question looked at Iseult sideways.

"No...No. I don't. He is a chauvinist pig who...STEPH!" Iseult glared at Steph's back as she skipped over to force a confused James to dance with her. By now all Iseult's sympathy for Steph had flown out the window, and she was wishing that she hadn't left her wand in her bag as she strongly wanted to cast a sharp Ricktusempra curse between Steph's swaying shoulder blades. She ditched me! Ditched me for that hideous...annoying...bigoted...

Iseult stormed off to the side of the room, where Sierra was watching Alessandro stuff his face with pies, sausage rolls and peach-flavoured pumpkin juice. Iseult sat down in a huff and started to wail.

"Steph ditched me for..."

"James?" asked Sierra, putting her arm around her friend. "Who cares? If she wants to have anything to do with that jerk, then just let her."

Iseult looked a bit miffed, but then nodded.

"Right then, who wants to play find Iseult a dance partner?"

_**Alessandro**_

'_Could someone please remind me WHY I'm dancing with Sierra Rehine?'_ Alessandro thought to himself conversationally. Sirius was going to kill him. Sirius was going to kill him and it would be long and painful. He shot an apologetic look at Sirius who was shooting daggers at him and Sierra. On any other occasion he would be more than happy to dance with any other girl wearing very low, very tight hipster jeans and a backless top which showed off more than ANY top should. In fact he would positively jump at the chance.

But then again, any other girl wasn't Sierra. Who was a. his friend, and b. currently being chased after by Sirius Black.

Alessandro really needed to stop getting himself into these situations. It was starting to make life extremely difficult.

"Er, Sierra?"

"Yeah?" Sierra was making sure that under no circumstances she was to make any eye-contact whatsoever with Sirius. This would have been highly amusing, had Sierra not been quite a good actress - especially in the field of flirting. (At least, Alessandro HOPED she was acting...)

"I'm getting a bit," He paused, trying to think of a word that wasn't 'Scared' or 'About to be Murdered' "Hungry. Can we go over to the food table?"

To Alessandro's delight the smallest hint of relief washed over Sierra.

"Great idea Aless, I'm getting a bit peckish myself."

The pair walked over to the food table and Alessandro began to completely stuff himself. After all, he had nothing better to do. Well, apart from being murdered by Sirius for dancing with the girl he was after. He didn't notice Iseult until Sierra had thumped him on the back, making him spit the custard tart he was eating onto the table. A group of second year Ravenclaw girls muttered 'Eeew!' and 'Gross!' but Sierra flipped them the finger and they scowled and moved on.

Iseult was standing looking thoroughly pissed off about something. And to be honest, Alessandro (for his own safety) didn't want to know what it was. Sierra was looking around the hall, apparently searching for something.

"CJ's over there." He pointed out.

"I know that!" snapped Sierra "We're looking for guys."

"Guys?" said Alessandro dumbly. Iseult rolled her eyes.

"Yes, guys! Now do you know any guys who are not complete idiots and are vaguely good looking?"

Oh god, thought Alessandro. There was really only one thing to do if he wanted to actually participate in the more physical activities of the year.

He ran.

_**Sierra**_

Sierra and Iseult watched Alessandro run off.

"Stupid little..." Iseult began, but then stopped herself for lack of really insulting words. Sierra rolled her eyes.

"Trust any guy who doesn't try to peer up your skirt when he has the chance. But WHY is he running?"

"No idea." said Iseult, shaking her head "Maybe he just doesn't want to point out hot guys to us." Sierra nodded, that was probably it.

"I'll bet those stupid pricks told him not to set us up with anyone" Iseult continued "They probably think its strange that we haven't 'fallen for their charms'"

Sierra snorted.

"What like Steph over there?" The girls looked over towards Steph who was brightly chatting up James Potter, he looked mildly interested - but was glancing round. Sierra thought he was probably looking for Iseult. She vaguely wondered where Sirius was when she realised Iseult had started talking again. Sorry, did I say talking? I mean ranting. Sierra interrupted her just as Iseult was beginning to get heated up.

"Well if we're going to find some guys I strongly suggest we head for the dance floor. That's where the majority of the guys will be."

Iseult thought for a moment, then nodded. "True. Come on, the band may suck but the songs are still good." The two girls headed back towards the mass of dancing bodies. Sierra began pointing out guys for Iseult, which was no small task. Iseult seemed to either have very high standards, or just wasn't interested in them.

"What about him over there?"

"Eew?! The one covered in pimples?"

"No, dickwad. The one with the cargo pants."

"Ugh, no way."

"Why not?"

"He's been staring at every girl on the dance floor for the past half hour."

"He what???"

"Oh shut up!"

"Alright, alright. Err, what about him?"

"Guy in blue shirt?"

"Yes!"

"No!"

"Why not! God you're a mission Iseult." said Sierra exasperatedly. If she wasn't mistaken Iseult looked the slightest bit smug about this. Suddenly Sierra spotted Snape not far off. She suppressed the urge to giggle and grabbed Iseult by the arm.

"What about him?" She asked delightedly.

"WHAT?! SNAPE?!" Iseult screeched a little too loudly, many nearby couples looked at her as if she had a possible mental disease.

"Ssssh!" hissed Sierra "Keep it down why don't you?" Iseult shuddered.

"You better not be serious"

"Its ok," giggled Sierra "I'm not."

"Good."

The band moved onto a new song and Sierra listened to it closely, she recognised the tune vaguely. The band, it seemed, had taken to 'tweaking' many of the songs so that they were louder and thumpier.

"A long, long time ago..." Dammit! What was that song?

"I can still remember..." It sounds so familiar,

"How that music used to make me smile..." The fact that it was quite slow and classical threw Sierra off completely. She could only think that it would pick up pace later.

"And I knew if I had my chance, that I could make those people dance..." Lots of students had begun to sing the words loudly.

"And maybe they'd be happy for a while..." 'Dammit,' Sierra thought _'I've been listening to this song all holidays, what IS it?'_

"But Febuary made me shiver, with every paper I'd deliver..." She could recall Danielle and Tristan singing it,

"Bad news on the doorstep, I couldn't take one more step..." She definitely recognised the words now,

"I can't remember if I cried when I read about his widowed bride..." Hold on a second,

"But something touched me deep inside. The day, the music... died." Sierra repressed the urge to scream with delight. She had been listening to this song all holidays and couldn't deny that she had become supremely obsessed with it. The schools version was absolutely fantastic. It seemed Iseult loved the song also as she was singing the chorus at the top of her lungs

"Bye, bye miss American Pie. Drove my Chevvy to the levy but the levy was dry, and them good old boys were drinking whisky and rye singing this will be the day that I die, this will be the day that I die!" Iseult grinned at Sierra and grabbed the nearest boy (A tall Hufflepuff) just as the drums came in and the music started to speed up. Sierra decided to follow her example and turned around and grabbed the nearest guy, flinging her arms around him. She prided herself on being a good dancer, especially with American Pie. Fabulous song that.

However she did get the feeling that Remus Lupin had never had such a shock in his life.

_**Remus**_

_'I am going to die today, die today, die today, I am going to die today because I danced with Sirius' girl...'_

_**James**_

With his super-seeker-sense eyesight, out of the corner of his roving eye, James caught sight of a dusty-haired Remus trying to dash from the hall but instead being re-grabbed by a girl in jeans that were...REALLY tight! The girl James was dancing with, (Stella was it?) forcefully turned him around to bring his attention back to her. She was a pretty girl, nice enough, But, James thought, a tad wistfully, Iseult is... He was brought back to the present when his partner "accidentally" stepped on, no, stabbed his foot with her stiletto heels.

His thoughts were being interrupted by a tune Steph was humming, so he racked his brains and tried to concentrate on organising his own thoughts, (while he was still sober, a state which would shortly deteriorate.)

_'You could have almost any other girl in the bloody year, most of them like you anyway, so of course you have to fall for a girl who hates your guts. Same thing happened with Evans! But nooo, she had to go and run off with Snape...and now she's ditched him for Lucius Malfoy of all people!'_

James scowled in the direction of the Slytherins as he recalled memories of his ex, Lily Evans, one of the many reasons that he and the rest of the gang hated Snape so much.

_'And Snape went after Iseult on the train! God, Sirius and I had short of publicly declared that she and Sierra were off-limits, were ours. That jealous bastard. If frickin Bellatrix hadn't come in I would have blown his friggin head off!!!...'_

"James! James! Are you alright?" Stephanie was shaking his shoulder vigorously. "You've gone all red!" James was sick of wailing girls.

"Yeah, I think I might just go and...Throw up!" he said brightly, intending to do no such thing. Leaving his dance partner at a peak of disappointment, James sauntered off to find Padfoot. If he didn't approach Iseult soon then that Ravenclaw blonde would forget about his threats and dance with her again.

_**Remus**_

Must...Get...Away...

Remus struggled away from Sierra, and then made a run for it, out one of the huge doors into the cool night air. As he ran, he heard his former dance partner mutter behind him,

"Great. Two guys run from me in one day? I am gonna murder Sirius Black."

_**Iseult**_

After 'American Pie' and Remus's escape, Iseult followed Sierra over to the side of the hall, by a door leading out onto one of the huge balconies, where CJ and Steph were waving at them. Steph managed a sharp "Hi" when Sierra arrived, in between her wailing and ranting on various topics, most being on James Potter. Subsequently, she completely ignored Iseult.

God, I'm fed up with her. "She can have the stupid guy I don't care."

Iseult realised too late that she had spoken aloud, but shrugged and added,

"Is there a way you can stop James from liking me? Because its sorta inhibiting me on the boy territory."

Steph groaned.

"Well how do you do it?"

"Hey, its not like I'm encouraging him!"

"Come on, you must have done something to make him like you?"

"Get it into your head, Steph, she hasn't done anything. Maybe she's just prettier than you?"

"Oh shut up CJ! That's horrible and completely untrue!" Iseult huffed and frowned at CJ modestly. Steph ruffled her shoulders appreciatively as Iseult continued, in a most tragic and exaggeratedly "English" manner,

"The more I hate him, the more he follows me!"

Sierra spluttered into her pumpkin juice and butted in, laughing,

"The more I love, the more he hates me!"

(At this point CJ and Steph were looking from Iseult to Sierra, Iseult to Sierra, quite worried, and even more so as Iseult continued,)

"His folly, Hele– I mean Steph, is no fault of mine."

And even more worried as Sierra made a wistful fainting action with her hand on her forehead and cried,

"None but your beauty; would that fault were mine!"

The two girls burst into hysterics, leaning over each other's shoulders to support their laughter. Steph chewed her thumb. Would James like her if Iseult went mad?

CJ hit her two friends over their heads affectionately.

"You little Shakespeare geeks!" The three more educated out of the four girls giggled at the utter sadness of the fact that Iseult and Sierra knew the play well enough to quote it at the right moment, while Steph stood, hand on hips, quite frustrated and wishing that they would stop acting like such idiots and get back to the current crisis – JAMES! Her prayer was answered when CJ's laughing face straightened slightly and she stood up.

"I think that the good old bard has given us a solution, girls."

"A solution about James?" Steph said offhandedly, as if she had been thinking about anything else.

"Yeah. You know," she paused, trying to think of a way to put it without hurting anyone's feelings. "Sierra and Iseult, and probably Lily Evans... And me of course," she added hurriedly, "are the only girls I can think of who haven't been victim to Sirius and James's "irresistible" charms." (CJ made the bunny ears sign around irresistible.) "Well, not publicly anyway." She added, thinking of Lily. "So, naturally, in a typical male 'Wants what he can't have' scenario, who are the girls that James and Sirius have made the most fuss about, and who have they chased after insistently, despite embarrassment and common sense?"

A cold, harsh wave of realisation hit the girls.

"Like Apollo to Daphne..." whispered Iseult in the softest tone of voice.

"So, you're saying..." started Sierra, "That if we pretend we like them..."

"They'll leave you alone." Nodded CJ, who felt very wise at present. "Think you could handle being nice to the dickheads until they get over you?"

Iseult jumped at the chance to have that presuming, arrogant...sweet in an annoying way...dickhead off her back!

"Hey, I'm game! Sierra might have some trouble keeping her fist under control though!"

Everybody laughed as Sierra poked out her tongue at Iseult and mimed punching her nose. Iseult laughed and glanced at the giggling girl next to her. The golden smile on Steph's face as she thought of James, made it all worthwhile.

_**Sierra**_

Sierra stood slightly inside the door, along with Iseult, who was pulling her top down in a nervous manner. Sierra vaguely wondered whether she really was wise in choosing a backless top for wearing that night. It was kind of cold. Iseult sighed melodramatically.

"You would think that by now they'd get the picture that we are standing here waiting for them."

"I dunno," replied Sierra thoughtfully "They could have taken the hint." Iseult snorted

"Yeah right,"

"I swear if they get any dumber..."

"You wouldn't be talking about us now would you Sierra?" came a voice from behind her.

Stuck up little... Sierra turned around and smiled at Sirius, looking up at him from under her eyelashes.

"I might be," she said teasingly "Then again I might not..."

Sirius glanced nervously at James, he was quite shocked that Sierra was actually talking, no, flirting with him.

"Well actually," said Iseult matter-of-factly "We were just saying how we really fancied having a dance with someone. We were jsut wondering who we should dance with."

Sierra struggled not to grin as Iseult pretended to wonder. James grinned widely at her.

"I'll dance with you if you want."

"Oh would you?" said Iseult soppily. Now Sierra was struggling not to giggle, this was getting funnier by the second.

"That would be absolutely fabulous!" Iseult continued in the same sickly sweet voice, batting her eyelashes at James, who was being thoroughly sucked in by Iseults theatrics. James offered his arm and Iseult took it, winking at Sierra as she walked past. She looked at Sirius who was beaming at her hopefully, and decided to have just a little bit of fun.

"Do you know where Remus is?" she said, on the verge of laughter "If Iseult is dancing then I'm going to have a dance too."

"No, I'm afraid I don't" _'Liar,'_ thought Sierra, _'You know perfectly well that he's standing over there, by the punch bowl'_ "but I'll dance with you." He flashed what he hoped was a winning smile and offered his arm, just as James had done. Sierra played with the thought of teasing him a bit more, and decided that there would be more than enough time to dance with him later. She was having too much fun at the moment.

"Oh there he is!" Sierra said happily "Over there, by the punchbowl"

Sirius' face visibly dropped, and Sierra felt slightly bad. But luckily she regained herself, think Steph, think Steph

"Do you think he likes me?" she said wistfully, trying to imitate how Steph was when talking about James (or any guy for that matter). "I don't really know if I'm getting the right signals you know?"

Sirius didn't look like he really cared about what kind of signals she was getting from Remus, so Sierra carried on. Twirling a strand of hair around her finger just as Steph did.

"You're good friends with him, what does he really like in a girl?"

As if sensing that they were talking about him, Remus turned round and looked at them. Sirius shot him a dark look and Sierra smiled flirtatiously and waved. Remus purposefully looked the other way. She mock-sighed and looked forlorn.

"I guess he doesn't like me after all," she said sadly. "Oh well, I'll just have to find someone else."

"Awww, it's ok Sierra." said Sirius eagerly, putting his hand around her waist. "Come on, you can dance with me. It'll make you feel better."

"You think?" said Sierra in a despairing tone. Boys were so easy to win over. Shame they were so dimwitted. "Well, if you really think so..."

Sirius wasted no time in leading her to the dance floor. Sierra noticed that his hand was pleasantly warm on her back... She shook off the thought and focused on the goal at hand. By then they had come up to near Iseult and James, and, dear god was it true? Was Iseult actually enjoying it? Sierra gave her friend the benefit of the doubt and assumed it was simply because Iseult enjoyed dancing, that she was smiling so naturally at James. After all, she had been a little more than outgoing with that Hufflepuff boy during 'American Pie'. That was just a great song, she wished they'd play it again.

Snapping back to reality she put her arms around Sirius' neck (ignoring the jealous looks from the group of Ravenclaw girls that she'd given the finger to before), not quite touching his shoulder blades. She felt his hands rest on her hips, just above the waistband of her jeans and began to feel slightly self-conscious. She blushed and looked away, trying to ignore the prickly feeling where her skin met Sirius'. He was a very good dancer, she'd give him that much.

She glanced at Iseult to distract herself and was shocked to find her friend's head resting on James Potter's shoulder. She tried to hiss at her friend, but stopped when she realised it would probably give the game away. Instead she turned her attention back to her dance partner, feeling more than a little miffed at her friend's betrayal. She had more important things to worry about however – Sirius seemed to have creeped a few inches closer while Sierra's attention was elsewhere. They were so close that she could almost feel his breath on her neck. But what really worried her most, was the fact that she was, well, enjoying it.

She really needed to get a grip.

Fast.

_**Alessandro**_

For the past ten minutes, Alessandro had been hiding behind a well-placed statue. Thinking it was safe, he crept out and inched over to the punch- bowl. Where Remus Lupin was nervously glancing around him. He felt for his dorm-mate. He knew exactly what he was feeling.

"So who are you hiding from?" Remus jumped, and let out a sigh of relief when he saw it was Alessandro.

"Err, Sierra Rehine."

"Sierra?" said Alessandro, startled

"Yeah, she sort of grabbed me during the 'American Pie' song. Saw you hiding behind the statue. Why?"

"I was, also, hiding from Sierra." Alessandro felt slightly sorry for her. Two guys blowing her off in one night. Harsh.

"Oh, right." said Remus, who looked like he too felt a bit sorry for her. "Where is she now?" Alessandro shrugged.

"I have no idea, I think she went outside to CJ and Iseult."

"Oh ok then, well I'll just... Stay here."

"Ok." Alessandro went towards the door he had last seen CJ exiting from. CJ had always seemed nice to him. Her twin, Steph, would be too had she not been so… loose, around most of the guys their age. She wasn't really that bad, he thought uncomfortably, she was just a little eager.

But CJ was nice, Alessandro decided. CJ was definitely nice.

_**James**_

_'OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD'_

_'She's dancing with me!!!!!'_

James was too happy to think about why Iseult, who had plainly hated his guts only moments before, was now very...enthusiastic about dancing with him.

But then, he was a boy.

And boys are intellectually challenged when it comes to girls.

_**Iseult**_

Iseult had the faintest idea that CJ's idea was WRONG.

Dangerously wrong.

Now James thought that he liked her.

And she didn't.

At all.

Not even just the tiniest...little...bit...

Ok, maybe just the tiniest...little...bit...

_'Shut up,'_ Iseult said to the voice in her head, which was laughing at her in hysterics.

"Shut UP!" she whispered aloud angrily. Her partner looked at her strangely.

"Is there something wrong? ...Did I do anything?" James blurted out.

After seeing Sirius roll his eyes behind Iseult's back, James cooled down a bit. His main aim in life was to achieve the look of Sirius's serene, don't- give-a-shit attitude. James knew that in private Sirius fidgeted and worried like hell, but in public, especially around girls, he was practically the Prince of Calm. James usually achieved this outward mode as well, except sometimes he...forgot. It didn't come naturally to him.

Iseult mumbled, "No, Nothing," and drifted off into her own imaginings. Head rested on James's shoulder, they were comfortably dancing a short distance apart, until James slowly gripped her hip and pulled her slightly closer. Every time he did this Iseult felt slightly more uncomfortable, until finally her head was screaming with a conscientious cry of "Why are you doing this!" and she shivered.

'I don't exactly feel comfortable, do I?'

'Was it fair to get all pissed off at him like that?'

'I mean, he's not really that bad tonight, and he didn't do anything to me reaaally. Except presume. And scare off all these other guys. And beat up Snape for no reason.'

'I wonder if there is a way to pretend I like him, without anyone realising that I really do like him.'

'Hmmm...'

Iseult looked around for help. James was getting a little too physical, probably thanks to Pettigrew's miming (of god-knows-what) behind Iseult's back. Iseult looked around for help. Sierra – Sirius was obviously being careful that the two girls couldn't communicate, as he had danced her away nearer to the stage, so she was obviously no help. Alessandro was chatting CJ up in the corner. Good on him. Iseult thought. However, as nice as this was, It was absolutely no help to the slightly stranded Iseult. She could have easily said, "Hey do you want to dance fast for this one?" but that was not the point. She wanted to get away. Pettigrew's miming was becoming more frantic now, he kept pointing at his watch and at something over the window, and then at Remus, who was standing nervously by the door as if unsure whether he should leave or not. Gazing around, she caught sight of a wistful Steph staring at her longingly. Poor thing...Click! Iseult clicked and made the tiniest evil smile, as she beckoned to Steph over James's carved shoulder. Evidently her partner noticed, as James pulled her away from him and looked at her face suddenly. Iseult's sleek smile disappeared hurriedly, but he looked over his shoulder anyway, in time to see a bright, cheerful Steph bounding up behind him. James gripped Iseult's hips tighter, but she slipped away and veritably pushed James into a beaming Steph.

Iseult tiptoed off to where she had seen Aless and CJ last, but they were either off dancing somewhere, or had found a little corner of their own. Although McGonagall had announced that morning that there was to be "No public proof of private passion" to be displayed, many couples had completely ignored this, and taken advantage of Hogwart's many passages and broom cupboards. Iseult grabbed a glass of spiced currant juice and drifted out through the doors onto one of the balconies.

A gentle wind swirled around the stone banisters, making leaves spiral and flinging them away from the castle, an island of luminosity in the night. Leaning over the balcony and looking down at the stone buttresses again, she almost imagined that she saw Trinity's ghosts again, but then a hand tapped her on the shoulder and she spun around. A tall boy with chiselled features was silhouetted against the brightness of the window.

"Would you like some more drink?" he said very softly, reaching out for her now empty glass. Iseult handed it to him, and tried to distinguish who he was, but he was just a black shadow.

"You looked like a ghost out here by yourself. Not that that would be unusual, Nearly Headless Nick has been moping about the stage all evening."

Iseult was a bit shocked. She hadn't prompted this conversation, had she?

"Aren't you finding it cold? I'm bloody frozen!" Said the mysterious stranger as he poured himself a drink.

"Oh, Yes, but it's too hot inside. My feet are icy cold!" He laughed, looking down at her shoes, which were the same ones she wore on the beach in Italy.

Iseult sipped her drink and thought quietly. A howl echoed from the forbidden forest.

"Hey, do you want to..." Iseult turned around, but stopped in mid-sentence. The boy was gone. The best thing that had happened to her all night had disappeared and she didn't know his name. One thing was certain. She could forget about James.

Sierra was standing by the drinks table with the rest of the crew. Alessandro had his arm curled firmly around CJ's middle, as if she would take a leaf out of Sierra's book and run for it. They were the most gorgeous couple, and complemented each other beautifully. Iseult couldn't help feeling jealous of CJ, with tall, blond Aless standing protectively by her side. _'Why are all the guys that like me complete pricks?'_ Iseult wondered crossly. She sidled over next to Sierra, who was also gazing at the happy pair warmly.

"So what happened to Sirius?" she asked casually, not having to pretend she wasn't interested any more.

"He ran off about 20 minutes ago. Steph said you ditched James and graciously gave him to her?"

"Yeah," Iseult laughed, spluttering into her drink. "You could put it like that. How did they get on?"

"He got sick of her, surprise surprise!" Muttered Sierra into her hand so that CJ wouldn't see. "She didn't seem to annoyed though. Steph's new official object of desire is..."

"Don't tell me." Groaned Iseult, expecting it to be Alessandro like everyone else.

"David Jones! In don't think she's forgotten about James though."

Iseult laughed. Poor Steph.

The dance ended all too soon. Without Sirius, James and their band being seen again, the crew of Gryffindors headed up to their Dorms, Alessandro rather reluctantly as he wanted to go across to the Ravenclaw one instead. Iseult hurriedly wiped off her mascara, pulled on her pyjamas, and slipped into bed.

Through the window, she could see a beautiful, white,

Full Moon.

_**AUTHORS NOTE:**_ Ok, not actually the chapter I thought it was. I forgot about this one. Erm. Anyhow, the next chapter is actually the one that I really like (I checked). I actually took the time to sit down and re-write most of it, so you'll probably notice a better standard of writing than the rest of the chapters. Sorry about that by the way, they were written a long time ago, before I bothered to do my English assignments.

Never mind.

Oh, and a random note, I'm the captain of my school's (and technically our neighbouring school - we've joined together and I coach them as a large group) theatresports team. We won our Semi-Final round last night and now we're into the finals, first year our school has ever done so. I've handpicked and coached this team myself so I am ridiculously proud of them. Which is why I wanted to share this little bit of info. Thanks for listening!!

Also, in response to a couple of reviews about **Ezrai and Tainia**... This story was actually written with no plot, intended for me and my co-author to amuse ourselves. I had initially planned to just post the (fluffy) chapters that were written and then ignore it for my other pieces, but I have decided to go through and figure out how to make a plot from it. You'll be pleased to know that Ezrai and Tainia play an important part in this later plot... So yes, you will uncover their mystery, but it'll take a while...

And before anyone goes nuts and points it out to me... the 4th year with pink hair is not Tonks.

_**DISCLAIMER:**_ I own stuff all. I think there's a pen or something that's rightfully mine but apart from that, Nada.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight: The Northern Wind**

_**Sierra**_

Sierra, Ginger, Alessandro and Iseult were sitting comfortably in the common room the next afternoon while James gazed longingly at them from an armchair appropriately distanced from the group. Remus, Sirius and Peter were nowhere to be seen. Iseult and Alessandro were playing possibly their seventh consecutive game of wizards chess (Alessandro was determined to win), Sierra was reading a book about song charms while Ginger was reading a quiz in one of those trashy muggle-teen magazines called 'Skip'. Every now and then she would call out one of the more amusing questions for the others to answer.

"Ok, here's one. 'Would you feel strange dating someone with the same name as a family member?'"

"I would definitely feel strange dating someone called 'Dad'" said Iseult "Check, by the way."

"Argh! I don't have any moves!"

"Move your bishop," pointed out Sierra. "That puts you in check with Iseult."

"Bugger." Said Iseult absently.

"Ok, you guys 'Have you ever been drunk?' Well? Have any of you been drunk?"

"No," said Iseult

"Yes," said Sierra

Everyone turned and stared at Sierra.

"Are you serious?" said Alessandro

"Yes," said Sierra calmly "I got drunk at Justin's 18th last year. He seemed to think it was funny to get me absolutely pissed."

"Exactly how drunk did you get Sierra?" said Iseult, highly amused. She couldn't really imagine Sierra drunk.

"Very. I do believe I puked on Justin though. Danielle was pleased. She was so angry with him..." she was cut off by a voice behind her.

"I don't believe this, Sierra Rehine has been drunk?"

Iseult rolled her eyes,

"It's not that hard to believe. Some people can actually have manners even when intoxicated."

From the look on James' face he didn't know what intoxicated meant.

"It means drunk." Sierra pointed out

"Oh," said James "I knew that."

"No you didn't!" laughed Ginger. "You looked so lost! Admit it, you had no idea what the hell Iseult was going on about."

"No. You can't make me." said James defiantly, reminding Sierra intensely of Justin.

"You're right we can't," said Iseult. "But we can ignore you."

She turned back to Alessandro.

"Checkmate"

"No," said Sierra "He can still move diagonally."

"Yay!" said Alessandro happily."

"Checkmate." Repeated Iseult, moving again.

Alessandro looked to Sierra for help, she shrugged.

"Nothing you can do. She's got you backed into the corner."

"Dammit!" said Alessandro "Re-match! I demand a re-match!"

Ginger sighed,

"That'll be what? The seventh re-match you've had Aless?"

"Eighth." Said Sierra vaguely; she had begun to read her book again. She felt someone look over her shoulder. Turning around she smacked into the face that had been peering over her shoulder.

"Ouch! That hurt!"

"Serves you right!" said Sierra, rubbing her cheek "Shouldn't have been there in the first place."

Sirius sat down beside her. She shuffled along a bit so they were farther away. He looked momentarily hurt but covered it up.

"So what's happening over here anyway James?" he said brightly

"Sierra was just telling us how she got drunk at someone called Justin's 18th birthday party." Said James, equally as brightly.

Iseult sighed loudly.

"Sierra was not telling you anything. So just piss off..."

"Who's Justin?" Sirius interrupted loudly.

"Wouldn't you like to know." Said Sierra, winking at him.

Ginger tried to hold back a laugh.

"Justin is Sierra's 19 year old fiancée."

"Really!?" said James excitedly.

"You're kidding right?" said Sirius worriedly

Sierra rolled her eyes.

"Yes! She's kidding. God you're gullible."

"Am not!" said Sirius and James together

"You are" pointed out Iseult, "You believed Ginger for a moment there."

"Only for a moment," Sirius pouted, he then turned to Sierra and grinned "So how are you this fine day."

"Just fine." Said Sierra. "Now if you'll excuse us."

She turned back to her book and started reading again. Iseult and Alessandro were already well into their eighth game, and Ginger was scanning the quiz for more questions.

"If you had any other name in the world, what would it be?"

"James." Said Sirius immediately.

"Sirius, then maybe the teachers would think I'm serious for once."

Iseult rolled her eyes. Sierra gave a laugh which quickly turned into a hacking cough.

"What about you Ginger?"

"I'd honestly prefer any name apart from the one I have now. I mean, come on. A red-head called Ginger? That's like calling a cat 'Mouse'."

"I know someone who called their cat mouse," Alessandro added, pondering what to move next "Her name was Elisabeth."

"That's nice to know." Said James, rolling his eyes.

"But why did your parents call you Ginger in the first place then?"

"Well, you see, it wasn't exactly obvious that I was going to have red hair. I was bald as a baby and absolutely none of my family members have red hair. Oh, and my grandma gave me this bothersome name." She made a face and poked her tongue out. Everyone laughed.

"But what I don't see, is how I got this hair in the first place," continued Ginger "I mean, everyone goes on about how I have my mother's eyes, my fathers nose, my grandma's chin, yadda yadda yadda."

"I've got my fathers hair!" James interrupted brightly. Sirius whacked him to get him to shut up. It worked. Sierra snorted. Sirius grinned at making Sierra laugh. Iseult rolled her eyes and chucked a pawn at Sierra. Alessandro commented vaguely,

"Elisabeth was really nice. She was kind of a family friend."

"Have you been listening at all Alessandro?" said Ginger exasperatedly.

"What?" said Alessandro.

"Oh never mind!" said Iseult rolling her eyes. Ginger had gone back to the quiz.

"'Do you have a nick name?'"

"Yes," said Sierra, Alessandro, Sirius and James

"No," said Iseult

"What's your nickname Alessandro?" asked Sierra

"Aless, you knew that already. Yours?"

"Si. Just by family though. What about you two?" Sierra continued looking at James and Sirius.

They looked at each other proudly.

"Well, Sirius is Padfoot, and I'm Prongs."

Ginger looked at them in disbelief.

"How the hell did you get those?"

"Aaah, that's for us to know and you to, well, not." Said Sirius.

"You're hiding something." Pointed out Iseult

"No we're not." Said James innocently.

Sierra sighed and picked up her books. "I don't think I really care anyway."

She turned and climbed up the stairs to the common room, Iseult following her – much to Alessandro's protests. Sierra frowned to herself. The conversation had been a good one and she almost thought, just for a second, that she might have seen the human side of Sirius Black.

_**Iseult**_

Iseult lay awake on her bed. The grandfather clock in the entrance hallway, only barely audible from the tower, had just chimed twelve. She could see storm-flung rain out the window, making no sound on the stone-silenced slate roof. But the wind howled. Like a nervous siren, rising and falling in tone. It flew between the turrets of the castle, making it's presence known with a loud clatter as a slate fell from the girls' tower onto Sierra's windowsill. Not colours, but the noises of the bleak wind haunted the castle's inhabitants that night, as even those few who were still now asleep felt the cold of the icy northern storm seep through the castle stones, and they dreamt of nothing but a malevolent winter approaching the castle. High spirits nested by the festivities of the previous night disappeared into a chilling mist. Iseult, her ears full of screaming noise and head empty of anything but shadow, had never felt so cold, so worthless and so very unloved in her life. As a figure stepped into her line of vision, arm outstretched, the only thought in Iseult's head was, "I mustn't scream. Its only death."

"Iseult? Iseult get up!" said death.

That's not death.

"Come on, McGonagall's downstairs."

That's...

"Trin!" Iseult cried, blinking her eyes to make them confirm what she heard. Trinity smiled nervously.

"Come on!"

Iseult sat up slowly, slothfully. At the bed next to her Ginger was shaking Sierra awake.

"I'm alive..." Sierra groaned as Ginger hauled her into sitting position. Outside the wind echoed her, persistently thrashing rain against the window every few moments. The chilled sensation in Iseult's gut, which had slowly started to thaw when Trinity had arrived, returned with new gusto.

"Grab something warm."

Ginger ran her fingers through her bed-messed hair and glanced anxiously at the dark, wet window. She and Trinity glanced at each other, and shared a look of uneasiness.

Iseult looked at them for a moment, still too dazed from tiredness to comprehend much except for the overwhelming cold. Slipping a robe on, she turned to see two shapes, each holding a lantern, stepping in the door. Ginger hurried up to meet them, and as they stepped inside, each holding a lantern high, Iseult saw the drained faces of Sirius and Alessandro. She tried to smile, but couldn't.

"Yeah, its from the North." Sirius whispered to Ginger, flashing sideways glances at Sierra. His voice was full of concern, but his eyes lacked feeling. They reminded Iseult of hollow stones.

"She's OK," Ginger remarked hurriedly to Sirius who had been looking at Sierra. "Does McGonagall want us?"

"Yeah, now. She's got chocolate, and the fire's warming up." Said Sirius, pushing past Ginger and Iseult and moving towards Trinity. Ginger sighed in relief and Iseult wondered why Ginger would look so grateful for chocolate, unless...Dementors?

Ginger and Alessandro were now conversing quickly, and Iseult heard Sierra and her names mentioned more than once.

"They've never been in this before...

"It wasn't as bad as this last time..."

Iseult, who was starting to collect herself, interrupted loudly,

"Are there Dementors? Here, I mean?"

Ginger just sighed.

"Yeah. You could say that."

Sirius, who had been helping Trinity wake up the shaken Sierra, left his charge and beckoned Iseult over to the window, with a dismissing wave at the others who put out their hands to stop him.

"She can cope."

He waited until Iseult was beside him at the windowsill, and whispered sadly in her ear.

"Listen to the wind. Listen real carefully."

Iseult had been listening to the wind all night, but she put her hand to the glass of the window and listened. Her ears absorbed and interpreted the sound now that she was making an effort to listen, and what she heard... Only Sirius's carved hand on her back stopped her from collapsing.

There were voices in the wind. Screams, Wails, Shrieks. A thousand pained voices from A thousand pairs of torn lungs poured their sorrows into her heart through the cruel wind. And every now and then, a different sound would pierce the fabric of this sorrowful cry. A low whoop, a cross between the cry of a seagull and the bark of a dog, mixed with a harsh sucking sound.

Iseult fell back, but Sirius had been expecting it, and caught her. He wrapped his arm around her waist and propped her up against him.

"Death..." Iseult whispered aloud, but Sirius shook her slightly, preventing her from lapsing backwards into another trance-like dream. He slapped her face gently with his free hand, bringing colour back into her cheeks.

"No, Iseult, it isn't...Can you hear me Iseult?"

"Mmm..."

"Its not, is it? Its just...just..."

"Fear..." she whispered.

"Yes." He said, relieved. (James would have no reason to throttle him after all.) Sirius sighed sadly and brushed the messed hair out of Iseult's eyes.

"That was the wind of Azkaban, Iseult."

After a team effort to bundle up Sierra, who was now fully awake and trying to tell everyone they were being silly, that she had just had a bad dream, the pack of Gryffindors hurried downstairs to the common room, where Professor McGonagall and the prefects were trying to control the wailing first-years, apparently by giving them chocolate, which helped enormously. Everyone over second year seemed much calmer, and Alessandro explained that the same thing had happened last year.

"What is going on?" Sierra demanded, obviously more shaken than she was admitting to be, as she looked around nervously in the direction of the windows. Professor McGonagall, as if in answer, rapped her knuckles on a table, and the girls drifted over to the group of students in their pyjamas who were gathering around their head of house hesitantly.

"Now, Gryffindors. Most of you, even those who were here last time something like this happened, will not have been told...what is happening." The teacher's face, usually stern and barely lined, was tonight aged, and she looked like an old woman.

"The truth is, for some unknown reason, one which the headmaster is very busy trying to discover, the summer storms, natural at this time of year, have come directly from the prison of Azkaban, and the headmaster believes that the unusual effects that most of you will be feeling, are related to the inhabitants, both jailed and jailers, of the prison."

A deep sigh of "Ohh..." echoed around the room.

McGonagall continued,

"Apart from feeling very fond of leading a law-abiding life, most of you will not be feeling up to working tomorrow. Therefore, the headmaster has declared that classes will not start until Tuesday, with a day of Rest tomorrow, especially for yourselves, as, being high up, Gryffindor tower seemed to have got the worst effects of...The Azkaban Wind."

Silence followed. Everyone was too miserable or occupied with someone who was too miserable, to show great enthusiasm.

"I think, that it may be best if you all go off to bed now and...ignore the wind? I'm sure that it will be dying down now."

Groaning reverberated around the room. Beside Iseult, Sierra huffed and sank down to the floor. In vain, Iseult tried to cheer her up.

"At least we're off again tomorrow. Sierra? Sierra?" Sierra had slumped herself on the floor, half asleep. Iseult tossed her hair angrily and restrained herself from kicking Sierra's dormant arse. To break her back dragging Sierra up a flight of stairs was about the last thing she needed, after having just been told that criminals and their unearthly guards, the infamous Dementors, she suspected, (who every wizard child would have grown up having nightmares about) were embodied in the wind sweeping around her castle. Now that she was away from the wide windows of the dormitory she was comforted a little. All together, she was a tad...no, more than a tad, pissed off by everything that was happening, and decided to do something that would piss off Sierra if she knew.

"Sirius!" Iseult called angrily, wanting to get back up to bed so she could attempt to get some sleep. Sirius strolled over looking troubled and leaving James and Peter in a heated argument with McGonagall. Remus Lupin was for some reason, missing.

"Yes?" said Sirius. Iseult looked up from Sierra (Sirius had nearly stepped on her head). His grey eyes had become dark and steely, completely devoid of the mischievous spark that Iseult had become used to seeing in them. There was a slightly deadened look in them that unnerved Iseult, apparently the wind was affecting everyone that night.

"Will you carry Sierra up to her bed, please? I'm really tired and just can't manage at the moment. Would you do that...for Sierra?" Iseult stammered, looking down at her friend again. He nodded and gracefully scooped up Sierra, holding her against him. He turned to move towards the staircase but Iseult stopped him.

"Where's Re-"

"Not here." He cut her off shortly, giving her a dark look. She dropped the topic. Sirius wasn't himself tonight and she wasn't sure that she wanted to get on the wrong side of him right now.

'_Maybe I ought to go up with them? Just to make sure that…'_

Suddenly, a loud crash and shout was heard from the bottom of the staircase.

Oh dear. Too late. Poor Sirius.

Iseult heard a familiar voice booming out her (slightly unjustified) anger on Sirius.

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU WERE DOING?"

"TAKING YOU UPSTAIRS" Sirius yelled back. Iseult winced.

"PUT ME DOWN!"

(clunk)

(slap)

"SIERRA!"

Everybody in the room was listening now, even McGonagall, who looked fairly smug, obviously happy that Sirius was finally getting bitch-slapped. Iseult could just imagine what half of Gryffindor would be taunting Sirius about for the rest of the week-

"Shame, Sirius! Beaten up by a GIRL!"

Another series of clunks came as Sierra stomped towards Iseult in combat boots. Sirius's combat boots. Iseult looked down at them blankly.

"My feet were cold." Sierra stated coldly. "Do you want to head back up to bed? I'm bloody tired and James just told me that the wind's pretty much died down.

"Sure..." Iseult avoided Sierra's eyes. She had the same dark look Sirius had. "When did you start talking to James?" she asked the sofa.

Sierra shrugged. "When did you start talking to Sirius?"

They both swept up the stairs, Iseult casting an apologetic look at Sirius, who was hunched in an armchair nearby, twirling a drink and staring blankly ahead of him. He was surrounded by a group of boys, clearly waiting until Sierra left so that they could torment him. Iseult didn't like their chances.

Ginger and Trin had been in bed for a few minutes, so Iseult hastily climbed into hers and blew out her bedside lamp. She lay awake for the second time this night, but this time, in guilty thought.

_'I hope Sierra really means she doesn't like Sirius.'_

* * *

_**AUTHORS NOTE:** _This chapter here is especially for KiraKakes, who made the effort to find out what theatresports is. I hope you enjoy this chapter as much as I did editing it.

**_DISCLAIMER:_** Turns out I do own the pen. I don't own the characters, or the idea for Harry Potter though… Bugger. I'd much rather have them than the pen.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine: Ashfae's Arrival**

_**Sierra**_

Sierra woke up the next morning, swearing loudly. For one thing half her covers were thrown on the floor, and she was cold. Also, Trinity seemed to be allergic to something and was busy having a sneezing fit. She leaned over to pull back her hangings, only to find that they were already partly pulled back... and slightly ripped at the end. She could see Ginger standing next to Trinity who was sitting on her bed, still sneezing.

"What's wrong?" asked Sierra groggily

"No... Idea." Said Trinity between sneezes.

"Are you allergic to anything?" asked Ginger worriedly

"Only... Dogs... And I'm... really... bad... with them... too"

Sierra sat, puzzled. Surely there were no dogs in the school. The letter she had got had only said that students were allowed to bring a cat, owl or toad. There was obviously no other reason to Trinity's fit of sneezing. She glanced at Ginger, who was thinking the same thing.

"Come on, let's take you to Madam Pomfrey. She'll have something to help you."

Trinity nodded, and let Ginger lead her to the door. She opened it, to find Remus Lupin standing nervously on the other side. Ginger shoved him aside and pushed Trinity past. Sierra looked at him blankly.

"What?"

"Er, James and Sirius uh, sent me here to... see if you guys were, um, ok..."

"Right," said Sierra, more than a little pissed. "Tell them to come here NOW."

It seemed that Remus was feeling a bit angry as well.

"TELL THEM YOURSELF. GOD WHY ARE YOU TWO ACTING LIKE SUCH BRATS? ALL THEY'VE DONE IS LIKE YOU AND SHOWN A BIT OF GODDAMN INTEREST IN WHETER YOU'RE OK OR NOT."

Sierra was taken aback and looked at Remus dumbfounded.

"What... I..."

"JUST BE NICE TO THEM FOR ONCE! GOD KNOWS THAT THEY'VE DONE EVERY BLOODY THING TO GET YOU TO LIKE THEM BUT YOU JUST TREAT THEM LIKE CRAP."

Sierra's mouth dropped open.

"THE LEAST YOU CAN DO IS TREAT THEM LIKE HUMANS. SIRIUS HAS BEEN WORRYING ABOUT YOU ALL MORNING HE'S BARELY HAD AN HOUR OF SLEEP."

"Uh, Remus... what are you doing in our dorms?" asked Iseult groggily "And why are you yelling?"

"sorry for waking you" he mumbled, then continued shouting "CAN'T YOU JUST GET OVER YOURSELVES AND JUST GO OUT WITH THEM?"

Iseult rolled her eyes, a little more awake.

"Let me guess, (yawn) THEY sent you in here to try and guilt us into going out with them huh? Well its not working (yawn)."

Remus lifted an eyebrow and glanced at Sierra, who looked horribly guilty.

"No, they didn't tell me to come here and guilt you. I just think that you should be at least friendly to them." He said softly.

Iseult looked like she was about to berate him but stopped, and Sierra could see why. Remus looked terrible. There were huge, purple circles under his eyes and he looked washed out and pale. She assumed that the combination of the Northern Wind and Sirius' lack of sleep didn't agree with him.

James, Sirius and Peter came up behind Remus, from the looks on their faces they really had no idea what was happening. Peter was hopping excitedly about behind Sirius and James, making sure he didn't miss any of the action. Sierra was about to say something but Iseult cut her off.

"Thanks for the advice Remus." She said softly.

James gave him a confused look. Remus blushed furiously and looked away. Sierra sighed and leaned against the door frame. It was far too early for tantrums yet.

"And welcome back."

Sierra looked up, confused, at Iseult. The comment was so quiet she wasn't sure if Iseult had said it at all, but she obviously had as Remus' head snapped up. He then started choking on a wad of spit, and Sirius had to bash him on the back to get him to stop.

Sierra ignored it, more annoyed by the fact that Iseult wasn't backing her up. She pushed past the boys silently (nearly knocking poor Peter over) and stormed out, through the common room and the portrait hole and into the hallway outside. If Iseult wanted to have a freakin' tea party with the prats she could. Sierra didn't care.

She didn't stop until she slammed into someone near the great hall.

"What do we have here?" said a cold, sneering voice.

Sierra brushed her hair out of her eyes and looked up. It was the kid she'd punched in the train.

"What do you want?" She said, getting to her feet.

"I want to know why a lowly Griffindor is running around in it's... pyjamas."

Sierra looked down, sure enough she was in her pyjamas.

"Oh, ok then." She said, and turned around and walked the other way.

After about half an hour she found the Owlery. By now she'd completely forgotten that she was angry at all and decided to send a letter. Which was all very well of course, except for the fact she'd forgotten to get any parchment.

Why did all the crappy stuff have to happen to her?

_**Iseult**_

Iseult Morgaine Camellia Peregrine was not a morning person.

On top of this, apart from last night's strange events still fresh on her mind, she had already been bombarded with other people's troubles this morning. Firstly, Remus had started screaming at Sierra and woken her up, and then started yelling at Iseult about something to do with Sirius and James. At the time Iseult's main thought had been He's so cute when he's angry! After Iseult had tried to settle the situation Sierra had stormed out of the common room, apparently huffed.

Now Iseult was hoping that James and Sirius would kindly go away so that she could get back to sleep. She should have known that she would have no such luck.

"Hey, Iseult," James asked after quick conference with his mates, leaning against the door alluringly, "I..." He flinched as Sirius kicked him, "We wondered if you would... If you and Sierra would like to come and watch our Quidditch practice today?"

Iseult's attention was caught instantly.

"Quidditch? Can third years play?"

"Oh yeah, Sirius and James have been on the team for a year now," Peter piped up enthusiastically, "Try-outs were moved forward to today but..."

Sirius waved in his face angrily, and hissed at him to shut up. Peter looked angry and began to mope.

"Try-Outs?" Iseult jumped up, ignoring the display "For what positions?"

James, and Sirius behind him both looked a little worried now. Remus was glaring at Iseult behind them.

"Not sure." James muttered quickly. "But do you want to..."

"Hey, I might just go find Sierra, see what she thinks." Iseult smiled broadly. "Will you be at tryouts?"

The boys nodded glumly.

"I might see you there then!"

She waved then shut the door in their faces. Just to be safe, however, Iseult grabbed her clothes and got changed in the bathroom around the corner. Quidditch! She loved Quidditch! And so did Sierra, she supposed, otherwise why would she have the latest broom in her cupboard?

Iseult hurried out to the common room, but even as she had one foot out the portrait hole, the thought struck her – where was she going? Sierra had not gone to breakfast in her pyjama's, had she?

So Iseult moped her way over to the fire to wait it out until Sierra came back to tell her the news. She sat down in a fat armchair, which, as it turned out – was already occupied. Iseult stood up quickly and apologised to Peter Pettigrew. Peter however, completely ignored her apology and started yelling, not at her, but seemingly at his friends who were sitting in nearby chairs also.

"SEE! NOBODY NOTICES ME AROUND HERE! I'M A PERSON TOO! START NOTICING ME, WHY DON'T YOU!" And he stomped out of the portrait hole that Iseult had left half-open.

Sirius shrugged as Iseult turned to him.

"Teenage Angst?" he asked in abandon, apparently unconcerned that his friend was upset at all.

Iseult sat back in Peter's abandoned chair and groaned.

"You don't happen to know where Sierra is, do you?" she asked, looking between Sirius and Remus. (James was not to be trusted)

James pulled a piece of folded parchment from his pocket and apparently, whispered something to it? He nodded then said,

"Nah, sorry, she didn't say, but...hey!"

James jumped as Sirius crept over and snatched the parchment out of James's pocket. He turned it the other way round and raised his eyebrows.

"Oh, she said she was going to the owlery, didn't she, Remus?"

"Yup." Remus nodded shortly. He was sprawled sideways across a chair, reading a book but glancing at Iseult every so often.

Iseult looked at each of the boys suspiciously, before tapping Sirius on the back of the hand, whispering her thanks, and dashing out of the portrait hall.

"She touched you," muttered James, throwing himself back in the chair. "I'm screwed, aren't I, Padfoot."

Sirius grinned. "Unfortunately not."

James glared at him cheekily, and threw a cushion at him. This progressed into a full-on fight shortly between James and Sirius. Remus groaned and exited the room as well, after muttering, "I thought only girls had pillow fights."

_**Sierra**_

Iseult walked in just as Sierra was about to have a huge tantrum.

"Iseult, please explain WHY all the crappy stuff happens to me?"

Iseult shrugged,

"Dunno, maybe because you asked it to?"

Sierra poked out her tounge,

"You don't happen to have a piece of parchment, and a quill for that matter?"

"Luckily," said Iseult pulling something out of her pocket "I just happen to have those very things."

"Great," said Sierra, sitting on an upturned bucket. Iseult handed her the parchment and she started scribbling on it furiously. It was quite cold and she wanted to get back to the common room.

'_Dear Justin and Tristan (DON'T LET DANIELLE SEE THIS!!! FOR YOUR SAFETY) You told me to write to you when I'd done something horribly evil.'_ She paused for effect, then remembered that they wouldn't be able to tell whether she'd paused or not.

Sierra skimmed it over once, just quickly. This was the kind of stuff Justin and Tristan enjoyed hearing. However if Danielle caught a wiff of it, she had a feeling that Justin would be quite severely castrated. Poor guy.

Iseult was standing patiently in the corner, flicking something out of her nails.

"Finished yet?" she asked calmly.

"Yeah, I'll just send it."

Sierra coaxed a random school owl down from the rafters and tied the letter to it's leg. Yawning she practically threw it out the window, ignoring the indignant hoot. "Well then, what to do today?"

Iseult looked thoughtful,

"Well there is Quidditch... the house trials are on today."

"Oh great!" exclaimed Sierra, brightening considerably "I love quidditch!"

"Doesn't everybody?" asked Iseult, rolling her eyes.

"Are you going to try out?" said Sierra, walking towards the door.

"'Course I am! What, did you think I was just going to sit there while everyone else had fun?" she mock-fainted "How can you think such a thing?"

Sierra giggled.

"You're such a drama queen. You should join the theatre, you'd be great."

"I should you know. Then you could say that you know the famous Iseult Peregrine!" she joked.

The two girls looked at each other seriously then collapsed into fits of giggles, it wasn't long until they had reached the portrait hole. Sierra managed to control herself long enough to utter the password. The collapsed through the portrait hole, arms linked and laughing madly (Sierra had a small tendency to snort a bit when she laughed)

A few minutes later Sierra and Iseult were dressed and ready to go. Sierra had put on her most comfortable jeans and a lime green tank top that said "DAMIEN ROWLAND USED ME FOR A SNOG AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT" for some reason, the thought that someone else was probably wearing the same t-shirt was extraordinarily funny. Her and Damien had got identical t- shirts when they had gone to his parent's house in Majorca. The only thing they had ever been were friends, but at the time it had seemed a really great idea to get a t-shirt saying that they had used each other for a snog. Iseult was wearing another of her Italian-printed t-shirts and jeans.

"Ready?" asked Iseult happily

"Hold on, I'll just get my broom." Sierra flicked open her trunk and grabbed her Nimbus 920, the very latest racing broom on the market. Danielle had bought it for her when she was accepted to Hogwarts. It completely whipped the old Silver Arrow of Tristan's that she had been using previously.

The two girls walked down to the Quidditch pitch, chatting happily about how older brothers were complete idiots, and the time Iseult had got her head stuck between the railings in the stairs at her house and had to be sawed out after no charm could make her head slippery enough to get out.

Happily chatting as they walked down the long winding path past the forest to the Quidditch pitch, the girls stopped as they saw the small cluster of Gryffindors preparing to try out, and the mass of people there to watch.

_**Iseult**_

"Oh."

That was about the only phrase Iseult could manage. Sierra, however, was not lost for words.

"Should some of those guys even be trying out? They look at least twenty!"

"Mmmm..." Iseult mumbled. She had started the walk along the path with confidence that she would get in, but now that confidence seemed to have flown away like an invisible snitch. She had been one of the best players at her last school, but then, France was not known for its butch Quidditch players. Sierra had a point. Half a dozen of the students were 5th, 6th and 7th year guys, practically made of muscle. Sierra shifted her broom to the other shoulder, and huffed.

"I bet that those bludger-brains have tried out every year since they have been at Hogwarts, and haven't had the skill or intellect to get in once." She grinned and cocked her head. "Besides, muscle hardly helps in Quidditch, they probably wont be able to get off the ground!"

Iseult tut-tutted her, much more contented. Sierra was right, after all. Weight did not equal speed. But that still didn't mean that either of them had a secure place on the team. There were only two places after all. Trinity had told them that she left at the end of last year, because she had been "doing it since I was five, couldn't afford a new broom and hated the rest of the team." The other missing player, a beater and Ginger's older brother, had left to become a "bloody bartender at the Leaky Cauldron," according to Ginger, who seemed quite disappointed. "And he got ten O.W.Ls as well!

Pondering, Iseult followed a calm, collected Sierra down the chiselled stone steps to the basin in which the Quidditch pitch sat. Late, typically, they hurried down to where the team and hopefuls were standing. A tall boy with a shadow of a goatee on his chin was noting down the names of the hopefuls. Behind him were the rest of the team, including Sirius and James, both basking nonchalantly in the sun. The girls sprinted up to the tall boy, dashing into the line and pushing ahead of an extremely butch guy who was looking the other way. As they got to the front of the line, Iseult coughed loudly, and the captain looked up at them, frustrated. When he saw them, he gazed lustily at Sierra's broomstick before turning around to Sirius, who dashed his head upwards, nodding. The captain turned back to the girls and turned to Iseult, who had her hand on her hip, frowning slightly.

"So..." He smiled, leaning forward to Iseult. "Does Sirius's girl want to join the team?" Iseult raised her eyebrows, thinking of pulling a Sierra and punching them both, but her friend spoke first.

"Yes, she does." Sierra remarked cockily, then stammered quickly, realising what she'd said, "Well, at least, he thinks I am. I'm not... His girlfriend, I mean." Iseult bit her lip to hold back the laughter, as Sierra blushed and continued, "And, and neither is Iseult. We want to try out though."

Apart from trying to stop herself laughing, Iseult noticed that the captain had himself recovered from his hysterics and was already looking around at the person behind them in the line. An idea struck Iseult's mind. Sierra will hate me for this. Thank God Steph's not watching. She nudged Sierra aside slightly and said to the captain, her head screaming at her not to,

"I'm Iseult, James's girlfriend? Can Sierra and I try out?"

Obviously the captain was as perverted as the third years he got on so well with, as he instantly looked back at Iseult and scribbled her name down on the list.

"Hey, I'm Will Scarlet, Gryffindor Quidditch captain. Sorry bout that, you know, blonde, automatically connected with Sirius! So...Have you had any experience in a Quidditch team previous to Hogwarts?" he said, suddenly serious, and looking out of the corner of his eye at Sierra's broom.

"One year as chaser, one year as seeker in the junior team for my house at Beauxbatons." Iseult replied, in businesslike fashion. "And I race. Or used to."

"You went to Beauxbatons?" asked Will and Sierra at once, one delighted and one shocked. "I thought you went to a little school?" Sierra added, hands on hips.

"Oui." She replied, smiling to herself, but ignoring Sierra's question. "Junior team, mind you," she added hurriedly. "I'm not as good as the world champions that come out of that school."

"Yeah, well we have a seeker, as you know, but have one spot for a chaser, do you want to try out for that? Racing, so you're a fast flyer, obviously?"

Iseult was thinking of being modest, but then realised that that wouldn't get her anywhere at a try-out, and so did the opposite. She didn't exaggerate...much.

"That, is an understatement. Though the tail-winds wont be that good today."

"Have a broom?"

"Like I would bring it to Hogwarts and have it nicked?"

He gestured to a stack of brooms leaning against the bottom of one of the spectator boxes Iseult grabbed a Starburst, which would be good in a relatively strong wind like this, and waited as Will interviewed Sierra, after trying not to stare questionably at her slogan T-shirt.

"Experience?"

"Two years in a Tora Academy team."

"Wow. Good team. Position?"

"Beater. I can seek too."

Will shook his head and called out. "A few people wanting your job, James."

Iseult heard the confident laugh from behind him. So that was what James's position was, the seeker. She had not yet figured out anything about James's quidditch skills, apart from that he was really, really good.

Sierra had finished, and Iseult was getting prepared to explain her false claim. She drew Sierra away to wait while the others, mostly huge guys in 5th year and up, or 3rd years like themselves, attempted to sign up.

"Look, Si, you do know I was hard out only trying to get us into the team, right?"

Sierra brushed her away, laughing. "Don't worry! Why would I think that you would have managed to secure a relationship with him only this morning? You don't like him, right?"

"Have I ever acted otherwise?"

"Yeah, you're right. Hey, why don't we..."

Suddenly the whistle blew loudly, signalling for the crowd to "SHUT UP" and the hopeful quidditch players to gather.

"Tell you later." Sierra hissed as they jumped up to join the rest of the students ready to try-out. Iseult looked back at the castle as they walked towards it into the middle of the pitch. It really was picturesque, a feat of magical architecture, with its stones gleaming in the midday sun.

After the interviews, the selection of students striving for each position had been greatly reduced, from more than a dozen people trying out, to only six. Iseult felt sorry for Sierra, who was competing against two older guys. Iseult had only one, a gangly fifth former, to deal with, and a girl who Iseult recognised from the common room.

The whistle blew again, and Iseult turned to see, not Scarlet, but another member of the team, a brown-skinned girl with dark curly hair who looked Brazilian or Jamaican. Behind her stood Professor Byre, the teacher who liked to scream at them to go to bed. Apparently also the Flying teacher, she clomped around her big boots, apparently annoyed that she couldn't do any work.

"In turn, when I say, I want you to fly around the pitch, as fast or as slow as you can, do a few laps, just to show us that you're confident with flying."

The students, all confident flyers, grumbled, but even so, she called out the first name, who turned out to be the gangly boy trying for the chaser position. He flew quite admirably, very good flying style, but too slow for a chaser, thought Iseult, with a critical mind. She hoped that the captain and the other girl saw his flying in the same light.

The next two flyers were the boys that Sierra was competing against. Brothers, as it turned out, and both flew well and had obviously practised. Too Slow! Iseult thought again. However, she had to admit, speed was not always the key to being good at quidditch. Ok, it was only one of many deciding factors. _'Why are you thinking this? You need strong morale, Iseult!'_

Iseult was having an uncanny feeling that she may have been a Quidditch coach in a last life, as her conscious was now coaching her in her mind.

After the two brothers dismounted their brooms (both falling over as they did so), and the next girl, a 4th year called Katherine had had a go, (Her speed was almost up to Iseult's critical standards but her turning was uncontrolled and she seemed to be a bit afraid of heights) it was then Iseult's turn. She ignored the cheers from the stand above (Ginger, Trinity and Aless, who had all turned up to watch, and the wolf-whistle (Remus, surprisingly), as she was blushing furiously, but as she mounted her broom she flashed a grin at her audience. Her mother had always told her that smiling was good for ones self-esteem. And she needed confidence more than extra quidditch skills now.

Kicking off from the ground felt wonderful, as she hadn't flown for at least a month, and no witch or wizard can get enough of the thrill of flying once they've tasted it. Spiralling up like a whirlwind, she wrapped her legs around the broom, which was a little slower than she had expected it would be, and pushed the broom forward, with a jolt of speed. She just needed to get the right angle...and she had it. She soared around the pitch a few times, then zigzagged from one end to the other, up and down, left and right. Down on the pitch, she heard the whistle blow. Iseult dived, and then spiralled back down to earth, hovering for a second before landing softly.

Exhausted, she went to stand beside Sierra, who was smirking slightly.

"I don't think James likes you now that he knows you're shit fast on a broom!"

Sierra was right, as James was moping obviously.

"I'm not that fast. I had a good teacher, that's all. And I always drop the ball anyway!"

The whistle blew again and Iseult waved goodbye, as Sierra's kicking off was awarded with much the same reception as her own.

Sierra floated lightly upwards, she then proceeded to dart around the pitch speedily. The Nimbus she was riding showed off her skills. Her turning was precise and accurate, and she was very well balanced. She sped around the pitch a couple of times, zigzagging with tight turns. Iseult didn't hear the whistle blow until Sierra was on her way down.

Sierra landed firmly on the ground again, and Iseult stared at her.

"That was really, really good. Shit, you're almost faster than me, I swear!"

Sierra shook her head at her friend's cluelessness. "Thanks Iseult! That's a really nice thing to say!" she whispered brightly.

"That's Ok." Iseult whispered back happily.

"Blondes." Muttered Sierra in the softest of tones.

Evidently, both Prof. Byre and the quidditch leaders were impressed with Iseult and Sierra's speed, but the fact still remained if any of them could hit a bludger or handle a quaffle.

"Pair up! A beater with a chaser."

Iseult and Sierra grabbed each other instantly, while the enormous rival beaters paired up with their slim chaser counterpart.

"Throw and hit exercise, no problem, but this is the last trial so watch it."

Will stroked his throat, voice hoarse, and tossed Iseult a quaffle, winking at her.

Iseult smiled sweetly, but turning to Sierra she muttered "Asshole," under her breath.

Iseult kicked off, with Sierra on her tail. They flew upwards on an air current until they were level with the top of the highest goalpost.

"Ready?" Iseult said, yawning. She tossed the ball over-arm at Sierra, who batted it back with the wooden beater's bat and Iseult caught it almost effortlessly, as Sierra was such a good shot.

"Impress them a little!" Sierra called, pointing down to where the rest of the team were standing watching them. For a moment Iseult thought she meant the boys, but after a second realised the obvious meaning, and grinned. She chucked the ball back towards Sierra, and the ball quickly came soaring back. Iseult reversed on her broom, and punched the ball back to Sierra. The ball came soaring back, but it was way over her head, and Iseult turned to get it, when she saw the exact direction it was going in – the goal on the other side of the pitch. But who was sitting in front of the goal, bat poised?

One of the brothers competing with Sierra for the beater position felt a sharp knock on the head. He spun around as the watching crowd laughed in his face. Iseult saw her chance to zip underneath the flabbergasted boy and catch the rapidly falling quaffle. She zoomed forward along the pitch after catching it at the tips of her fingers, and threw it into the goal at the end that Sierra was soaring around, laughing her head off.

"Good aim! I'm glad I don't have to play you, Si!"

Sierra's lungs were too full of laughter to answer properly.

"...Thanks, real...ly...shit...hehehe..."

A sharp whistle pierced her giggles. The two girls flew down, still laughing.

"Did you see...the way he looked around?"

Sierra wobbled on her broom as she laughed. The girls dismounted, and stood up to see the girl captain frowning at them sternly, hands on her hips. They gulped, but their throats loosened when they saw her mouth twitch, obviously struggling not to smile. The rest of the team were also in various states of laughter, ranging from Sirius' hysterical barking laugh meant to flatter Sierra, to Professor Byre, who looked ready to shout at someone.

"THE CAPTAINS HAVE MADE THE DECISION AS TO WHOM THE NEW PLAYERS WILL BE. WOULD THE AUDIENCE AND COMPETITORS PLEASE BE SILENT?"

Professor Byre did not need an amplifier charm to be heard by all, so the cheering and whispering subsided to an anticipated murmur. The captain stepped over to the teacher, and pointed at his throat before rapidly whispering something. Byre was only too happy to shout some more due to Scarlet's sore throat.

"THE NEW TEAM MATES ARE- TO REPLACE TRINITY RUSSEL, CHASER, ICEOLT PEREGRIN."

"Well done, Ice-olt." Sierra hissed in her friend's ear, grinning.

"TO REPLACE HAMISH O'RORK, BEATER, SIERRA RENNY."

"Eeee!" squealed Iseult, hugging Sierra. "Well done! You deserve it!"

"Thanks," Sierra covered her ears, temporarily deafened from Iseult's shrill squeal.

"I'm so glad we're in the team...Miss Renny."

Sierra glared at her and wielded her bat in mock ferocity. They're silent giggles were halted by the gruff cough of their new teammate. The curly- haired girl grinned at them tentatively.

"Hey, great show!" she mentioned as she rustled them over to the shady spot where the rest of the team were standing. "You could both use a little bit of training..."

"Don't tell them that!" yelled Will Scarlet as they approached him.

"Well its true!" said the three girls, almost on cue. Will ignored them, and grabbed Sierra and Iseult, dragging them over to where James, Sirius and one other boy were sitting.

With much pomp, he waved his hand over them dramatically.

"I introduce you to your team. Iseult, you are already very familiar with James our seeker, and I gather from that you both know Sirius as well, who will be your team partner as the other beater, Sierra."

Sierra and Iseult looked at each other with pitying eyes. Sirius and James simply smiled as they were introduced.

"The players you probably haven't formally met are the other two chasers, Nike Green, who is also the um...deputy captain..."

"Which means I do all the work." Butted in Nike, the curly-haired girl who had walked in from behind them, grinning. "I'm sixth year, which is why I aint captain!" Will huffed in annoyance.

"Our other chaser," he continued, ignoring Nike's teasing face and pulling a dark curly-haired boy by the shoulders to stand up, "is Jacques Morrigan. He is absolutely amazing with a quaffle, almost as good as Trin even, but he does need a lot of practice at teamwork and communication between..."

"I am standing right here you know." The boy kicked his boot into Will's instep.

"Jack." The boy said, dodging his captain's responding lash out and shaking both the girl's hands, smiling, before seeing someone behind them, and going over to meet them.

"Hey! Aless!" Jack strolled off and Iseult followed him. Alessandro, with Remus in tow, jogged towards Iseult and Sierra. Jack raised his eyebrows at their evident friendship.

"You guys were great! Sierra, that ball you threw at Sandy Canyon was Amazing! From almost the other side of the pitch!"

Sierra burst into a fit of giggles at Sandy Canyon.

"Is that the guy's name?" Iseult asked, significantly less amused than Sierra, who was still trying to stifle her laughter. Alessandro nodded in reply.

"So how do you two know each other?" Iseult questioned of Aless and Jack.

"Hagrid." Said both at once. Jack was about to start a conversation with his friend when Sierra butted in.

"What's Hagrid?" she asked, recovered from her laughing fit, just as a shadow loomed over them. Iseult turned around to face a large, large, large wizard, who in Iseult's eyes was strikingly similar in appearance to a worn- out brown teddy bear.

"I'm Hagrid!" said Hagrid. "'ello!"

The two girls, neither of them tall for their age, looked up at this shaggy silhouette in bemusement, while Aless and Jack greeted him warmly. He soon turned back to the two new Gryffindor teammates, beaming.

"You two 'ill be the new playerrs?" he said, rolling his 'R's. Iseult couldn't believe that his accent was real as it appeared to be. She and Sierra both nodded cheerfully, attempting to pretend that seven, eight, nine, ten-foot people were no big deal for them, that they saw them every day. The silence was broken as Will strolled over to Hagrid amiably.

"Did you see how fast these two went?" Will grinned. Iseult had a strong feeling that she and Sierra were like the latest, fastest broom on the market for their new Captain.

_**Sierra**_

Later on that night Sierra, Ginger and Iseult were sitting in the dorm. Iseult and Sierra were playing wizards chess (or in Sierra's case – trying to play wizards chess) while Ginger sat on her bed reading another of her muggle magazines, when a strange girl entered the room and dumped her trunk and other various bags at the spare bed on the northern side. Ginger looked up and grinned at her.

"Glad you could join us this year, Ash."

The girl who supposedly was 'Ash' flipped her long tawny hair over her shoulder and imitated Ginger.

"Well you know, I was going to not come... but then I thought, who's going to torture Trin if I'm not here?" the girl turned to Sierra and Iseult

"New girls huh? Bet Trinity hates you."

Iseult looked slightly shocked by this seemingly outgoing girl,

"Er, yes. How did you know?"

The girl laughed and started rummaging around in her trunk, as she did this she said,

"Coz you're here replacing Ez and Tani, who were Trinity's best mates up until last year."

"What do you mean until last year? Why didn't they come back to Hogwarts?"

The girl shrugged and continued rummaging

"Died. Voldemort got them and their whole families. Ezrai's dad was an Auror and both Tania's parents were aurors too."

"Oh," said Sierra, slightly horrified "That's terrible! Poor Trin."

"Let me guess Ging, Trin's been sucking up to you?"

"Well… Yes." Ginger said, uncomfortably.

The girl laughed again,

"Well let me see... Ez and Tani are gone, so she's friendless. She obviously thought that I was dead too. So naturally seeing as both Ginger and Trin are both devoid of friends then you two would instantly become mates." She snorted "Not a chance in hell though, now Ashies back!"

Ginger shook her head and stopped her.

"Hold on, why weren't you on the train anyway?"

"Uncles funeral"

"Oh, I'm sorry Ash!"

Ash shrugged and closed her trunk with a thud.

"Never knew the bastard anyway. Apparently he was a really evil piece of work. Apparently he was right in with you-know-who, better off dead. Left the family a hell of a lot of cash though. Dad wanted to send me to Durmstang. I was like 'Hell no!' I'm not going to learn any of that dark arts crap." She paused for a while, turning round and pulling on a t-shirt. After she was finished, she continued

"Can't wait till I can leave home. Mum seems to think that I'm horrible and evil for even being put in Gryffindor. Screw her, I say."

Ginger rolled her eyes.

"I thought you would at least learn to shut up over the holidays, your ranting is worse than ever!"

"Sorry!" she grinned and turned to Iseult and Sierra, who were slightly shocked by this loudmouthed stranger "I'm Ashfae Moira by the way. Who're you?"

Iseult and Sierra exchanged glances,

"Er, I'm Iseult Peregrine and this is Sierra Rehine."

Sierra waved timidly and smiled at the girl.

"Well, anyway. I need to go and tease Black. A little birdie told me that he recently got beaten up by a girl."

"That would be Sierra," Ginger laughed, putting her magazine away "He's been trying to hit on her and she slapped him."

"Good on ya!" exclaimed Ashfae happily "It's about time he was rejected by a chick."

After a bit more happy chatting on Ashfae and Ginger's part (Sierra and Iseult continued their game of chess in uncomfortable silence) Ashfae left, presumably to find Sirius. Iseult turned to Ginger.

"Who WAS that?" she asked, in slight shock.

"Well, that would be Ashfae. She's a bit of a shocker but you'll get used to her." She paused in thought momentarily "I hope Trinity's not in the common room."

"Why?" Sierra asked, confused

"Well lets just say, Ash is to Trin as..." she paused in thought "as Potter is to Snape."

"That bad huh?" said Iseult

"Yeah. They hate each others guts. No idea why. I think its got something to do with before school. I swear to god they're going to kill each other one of these days. Ash almost killed Trin last year. Jesus it was horrible, but then again Trin pretty much did the same a few days later. Sirius and James don't help, they just egg them on..." Ginger was cut off by the sound of screaming in the common room.

"Oh god,"

Ginger blanched and ran out of the dorms. Sierra and Iseult exchanged a curious glance before following her. The sight they met when they reached the common room was far from a happy one. Ashfae and Trinity were standing in the centre of the room, wands out. Half the furniture had been overturned and thrown across the other side of the common room. The two girls were periodically screaming at each other and throwing curses, extraordinarily advanced curses Sierra noted with slight shock. Curses she knew from experience could easily harm a fully-grown wizard when used properly, and could be deadly in the hands of two thirteen-year-old witches on a rampage.

Ginger had frozen to the spot, she turned around and glared at Sirius and James, who were staring with shock at the scene in front of them.

"DO SOMETHING!" she screeched at them, hair flying out in rage

"LIKE WHAT?" Sirius shouted back

"ANYTHING! I DON'T CARE! JUST FUCKING GET THEM AWAY FROM EACH OTHER. THEY'RE GOING TO KILL EACH OTHER SOON!"

Sirius went paler, if it was as all possible. He was almost as pale as Snape by comparison. And that was really no mean feat.

Sierra wrung her hands in nervousness. There had been fights back at Tora, but nothing like this one. Although half the students knew fatal dark curses – they hardly ever used them.

"We should do something Iseult!" she whimpered

"Like what? There's nothing we can do. If we do anything we'll get killed." She said fretfully "And if we don't do anything they'll get killed."

"Oh man... Jesus they really do hate each other don't they"

Suddenly a light bulb flashed in Iseult's head.

"Get Lupin!"

"What?" Sierra asked dumbly

"I said, get – Lupin."

"Uh, why?"

"COZ HE STILL HAS MORE THAN FIVE BRAINCELLS LEFT" she shouted in frustration,

Sierra jumped slightly and across the room to the boy's staircase. Trinity hurled another curse at Ashfae.

Luckily for Ashfae, she ducked.

Not so lucky for Sierra though.

'God Iseult is scary,' Sierra thought as she crumpled to the ground 'Remind me never to piss her off'

_**Iseult**_

'Shit'

'Holy shit.'

Iseult stopped her Catholic grandparents from getting into her head just in time. Ashfae and Trin were still screaming a jumble of hexes and curses mixed with swearing at each other, dodging the other's curses and every now and then leaping over a chair or some other furniture, in order to have a better range for targeting. Neither of them had noticed Sierra, sprawled on the floor behind Ashfae, likewise the rest of the Gryffindors, who were too intent on the fight to notice not only Sierra, but a handful of others as well, who had either been hit by curses or flying furniture. Iseult shook her hands frantically, and decided that is was time to act. Trinity had just been hit by a soaring side-table, and so was hopefully too intent on her bruised shoulder to attack back at Ashfae. Keeping low, Iseult counted in her head, _'One, Two, Three...Four...Five..."TEN!"_ and she dashed out from her nook between two seats, and made a beeline for Sierra who was lying limply behind Ashfae's combat boots, in danger of being stepped on. Iseult grabbed her friend by the shoulders and dragged her out. She dared not use another spell on Sierra to make her easier to take out, in case it mixed badly with Trinity's curse, which Iseult could not for the life of her identify.

A lightening in Iseult's load startled her, but she turned around to see Ginger, faithfully helping her drag Sierra back to the shelter and safety that an upturned couch gave. Remus, being the doormat that he tended to be, had come out from his former hiding place upon hearing Iseult's screams, and was now sitting against the couch, head in his hands. Before he could start singing his traditional terrified _'I am going to die today,' _song, Iseult ducked down beside him and poked his leg with her wand.

"Ok, so what curse did dear little Trinity use?"

Remus gulped. He's in trouble if he doesn't know. Iseult thought grumpily. Thankfully for Remus, he knew perfectly well.

"Not a curse, sleeping spell. Fourteen hours it lasts, usually." Remus mumbled into his hands.

Iseult sighed, relived. "I thought it might have been a curse! Which sleeping spell?"

"Ooh, I don't know, Its a fierce one. Dormirio Direre." Remus said, lifting his face from his hands and wincing slightly. "The dreadful sleep, often used on Muggles that need to be got out of the way for a few hours." Iseult winced back.

"Yeah, that's another one they teach first year dark arts students. But it'll be twenty hours minimum that she'll be out if we just leave it and let her rest..." Iseult paused as they heard the clatter as something made of glass smashed behind them – Trin and Ashfae were still at it, and no one had managed to hinder them in the slightest. She and Remus were almost shouting at each other over the sounds of screamed spells and splintering wood that echoed around the common room. Iseult looked around shiftily, but continued; "But she probably needs to be up pretty quickly otherwise there is a danger of her being trampled, so...You can't do a Latin-root awakening spell by any chance...What?"

Ginger was looking from Iseult to Remus, and back again, in horror.

"You Geeks!" she cried, throwing up her hands in mock dismay. Ginger walked off in a huff to the centre of the room, to try and yell some sense into the still duelling pair, while Iseult and Remus peered over the couch at her in disbelief.

"We are SO not 'geeks'." Iseult glared at Ginger's back, bending her fingers like quote-marks around geeks.

"Yeah," Remus nodded, the dilemma of the unconscious Sierra all but forgotten. "I bet that she's just jealous."

"So true. You're probably right." Iseult said, making herself feel better. Remus turned around and sat back down by Sierra.

"So what were you saying about Latin-rooted awakening spells? It sounded interesting."

After about ten minutes perfecting Remus's Surgito spell, they performed as one and Sierra soon jolted up into sitting position, opening her eyes to a wand pointing into each of her eyes.

"Yay!" Iseult jumped up and down, almost forgetting to duck down again quickly. While Sierra came back to her senses, the three Gryffindors sat cross-legged behind the up-turned couch and made sure to keep well away from the target range of the two "rampaging chicks with wands and bad aim" as Remus called them when Sierra asked who had attacked her. "A dangerous combination." Iseult agreed. Since the last time the girls had experienced Remus alone, he had lost his annoying habit of singing irritating songs under his breath, and instead had taken to looking around the room nervously whenever anyone mentioned Quidditch. Iseult was trying to awaken Sierra more by having an animated discussion with her about the merits of Nimbus series brooms. This of course became an argument, which was exactly what Sierra needed to bring her into full consciousness.

"OF COURSE NIMBUS BROOMS ARE BETTER THAN MOONDUSTERS! ARE YOU MAD?" screamed Sierra over the background clatter of Trinity and Ginger's ongoing fight. Iseult, confident that Sierra was wide awake, nodded happily and tried to drop the subject, as she of course had agreed with Sierra all along. Somewhere during the course of their argument Remus had started humming his annoying little song again, and was looking around for an excuse to escape. Sierra, after glaring at Iseult testily for a few moments, turned around and peered over the couch, before ducking back into it's shelter quickly, obviously slightly traumatised, which was appropriate considering she had just been cursed and awoken to find two people waving short sticks in her eyes.

"Where's Alessandro?" she hissed at Iseult, who was lying on the floor, her head on a pillow.

"Gone to get Hagrid." Remus said, leaning back to look Sierra in the eye. "McGonagall and Byre are in an "important staff meeting" in the great hall.

"Drinking butterbeer, basically?"

Remus nodded, smirking.

"Good, finally someone to control them! It was getting a little out of hand!" Iseult frowned as Sierra and Remus looked at her in disbelief, Sierra replying uncouthly,

"A LITTLE out of hand? Did you not see what Trin did to the furniture! Not to mention what she did to ME!"

Iseult shrugged.

"Yes, but now its just stopped being interesting and I want to go to bed."

Sierra threw a cushion at Iseult's fair head.

"You are so..."

Iseult threw a cushion back into Sierra's face.

Before they could start an argument, the portrait door swung open. A huge wizard ducked underneath the stone entrance arch into the comm., and Hagrid in all his glory towered over the duelling students. Behind him and slightly to the side stood Professor McGonagall, wand at the ready. But it did seem that she was...less in the forefront than usual...

"Is it just me, or is McGonagall hiding behind Hagrid?"

Remus snorted a laugh.

"Last time Ashfae and Trin fought like this, Ash hit McGonagall with a poultry curse."

The girls both coughed in choking laughter, as an image of a feathery, clucking Professor dashed across their minds. Suddenly a smirking Remus tugged their robes and hissed at them to be quiet, and the three of them bobbed their heads over the couch to peer at the two duelling girls, who's fight was rapidly being dissolved with the help of McGonagall and the gamekeeper's combined spells. Hagrid, unusually, seemed to be using a black umbrella instead of a wand, and not in front of McGonagall, but as he seemed to do the job of restraining Ashfae well, using an assortment of weak binding charms, nobody commented. As the teachers and prefects tried to mend most of the furniture, Iseult saw Alessandro sneak through the chaos of the comm. to the spot behind the couch where Sierra and Iseult were waving at him from. He sat down with his hands in his jean pockets, and after greeting Remus with an overly complicated handshake, similar to the ones often shown in American muggle movies, which made both the girls raise their eyebrows and groan under their breath. In whispered tones Remus and Iseult hastily explained the cursing and revival of Sierra to their two friends, with Alessandro bursting into minor fits of jolly laughter every now and then, soon dampened by Sierra's threatening gaze, while in the background were the sounds of shouting and muttered curses-both magical and non-magical, as Trinity and Ash were being reasoned with. They were still screaming their heads off at each other, but as far as Iseult could tell – she had left the explaining to Remus and was trying to eavesdrop on the fight behind them – in a combined effort between McGonagall, Hagrid and Ginger, they had managed to get both girls to put away their wands. Their exchanging of insults was still incessant, however.

"DO YOU THINK I AM GOING TO LET HER TALK TO ME LIKE THAT, PROFESSOR?"

Trinity was screaming at anyone who came near, while Ashfae just tried to provoke Trin as much as she possibly could. Before McGonagall could answer Trinity in some logical manner, Ash casually half-yelled at Trin,

"WHY DO YOU THINK YOU GOT KICKED OFF THE QUIDDITCH TEAM? HEY TRINITY?"

Iseult raised her eyebrows in shock. Alright, that's just unfair.

"Remus," she hissed at him, "didn't Trinity chose to quit the team?"

Remus had obviously heard Ash's latest remark, and also was turning around to watch now.

"Yeah..." he whispered, trailing if in thought. "Yeah, she did..."

Suddenly, Remus had leapt over the couch and taken flying steps towards the area in the centre of the common room, where the two girls on a rampage were getting dangerously close together, still calling each other a multitude of unoriginal names and muttering magical curses under their breath, to no effect whatsoever. By the time Remus had gallantly bounded over to stand beside Ginger and hopefully scream some sense into the two girls to simply go back to bed, Ash and Trin were glaring at each other from little more than a metre away, both looking prepared to wring the other's neck.

"Hey, I qualified didn't I? I got in in the first place. Unlike you..."

Ashfae scowled upon hearing Trinity's calm remark. But then, after a moment of thought, she smiled maliciously and said loudly,

"Yeah, it's a pity...My parents were looking forward to watching me play..."

Trinity coughed, choking in surprise. Her eyes almost glazed as Ash continued.

"Pity your mother couldn't make it to see your games...I bet we both would have loved that, am I right Trin?"

Trinity leapt backwards and reached for her wand, her face contorted with disgust. Remus saw his chance and jumped towards Trinity, grabbing her arm and pulling her aside before either of the girls had the opportunity to aim, while Ginger attempted to do the same with Ash. Pretty soon Remus had pulled Trinity over to McGonagall, who swiftly gave her a calming-draught soda and two weeks worth of detentions. Far on the other side of the room professor Byrne was doing the same to Ash, although Iseult smugly noticed later that Ashfae was given an extra week of detentions for "repetitive provoking of another student".

After the rest of the Gryffindor students had deemed it safe to come back out in the open, Professor McGonagall addressed them all telling them all to go to bed, and "definitely do not talk about this occurrence to any of the students involved in tonight's events now, because they need rest more than any of you."

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** Hurrah! This has to be the most pointless, unnecessary chapter ever… But I like it because I quite like Ashfae. Anyway thanks to all who have reviewed, especially Pyra250 and KiraKakes. Thankyou for your honesty in reviewing!

**_DISCLAIMER:_** If I owned this I wouldn't be a penniless student, would I? But either way I own nothing that you read.

**_CLAIMER:_** The pen is still mine.


	10. Chapter 10

**Chapter Ten: Classes. Finally.**

_**Sierra**_

When Sierra woke the next morning, it was to a seemingly happy environment. Ashfae and Ginger had dressed into their school robes and Iseult was sitting on her bed rubbing her eyes groggily and telling everyone that there was nothing to worry about. Sierra had absolutely no idea what Iseult was talking about, actually she greatly suspected that she was fast asleep. _'This can easily be fixed,'_ she thought to herself happily. Sierra stood up and picked the pillow off her bed, tiptoeing behind Iseult, only to have a pillow shoved in the face by said person.

"Eep!" shrieked Sierra

Iseult had to control herself from falling off the bed in laughter. She was doubled over completely with her hands clutched around her stomach.

"You are so loud you realise..."

"Are you saying I'm fat?" asked Sierra indignantly, sitting on Iseult's bed.

"I might be," said Iseult, eyes flashing.

Sierra narrowed her eyes and growled.

"Er, then again I might not."

"You better not. My bite is worse than my bark."

"Well as long as it's not as bad as your face..."

"RIGHT!" Sierra whacked Iseult with the offending pillow, Iseult shrieked and covered her head with her hands in defence, before promptly falling off the bed. Ashfae had come over and was cackling evilly. Ginger was rolling her eyes and saying something about 'childish activities'. Iseult rose from behind the bed, holding her hands over her head in a gesture of surrender.

"I give up! I give up! Stop torturing me!"

"Can I?" asked Ashfae happily, clapping her hands like a young child.

"NO!" shouted Iseult, diving behind the bed as Ginger, Ash and Sierra laughed. Suddenly the door opened and a cold voice radiated around the room.

"I highly suggest that you get down to breakfast now, before you miss out." Trin glared at Ash and narrowed her eyes "And I'm sure we don't want that do we?"

Sierra and Iseult exchanged a glance before looking at Ash, in trepid anticipation. Ash put her hands on her hips and rolled her eyes.

"For gods sake, Trinity," she spat out Trin's name like it was some kind of poison "Stop being such an old woman."

Trinity narrowed her eyes and opened her mouth to say something, but was cut off by Ginger, who over-cheerfully suggested that Sierra and Iseult get dressed. Trin snorted and swept out of the room.

"Wouldn't want you to miss breakfast now" said Ash in a mocking voice. Ginger giggled slightly and Iseult looked at Ash disapprovingly.

"You know, you really should stop dissing Trinity."

Ash turned to Iseult, a look of utter disbelief on her face.

"You didn't just say what I think you did, did you?"

Ash didn't exactly look dangerous, just a bit sceptical, like Iseult was playing some kind of strange joke on her. Sierra dearly hoped she was – for Iseult's safety. _'Oh dear,'_ thought Sierra '_Not good, not good at all._'

"I'm not kidding, I'm merely expressing my opinion. It is a free country after all," said Iseult cleverly "Trinity's going to get her own back one day."

"She's right you know," said Ginger thoughtfully "Just lay off her for the year alright?"

"You don't get it do you?"

"Get what?" asked Ginger in a strangely calming voice

"You don't get the fact that me and Trinity have hated each other for ages, for reasons neither of us are proud of," she paused "Well, I don't know about Trinity but I'm not proud."

Sierra took this time to pull the curtain around her bed and get changed into her school robes (and the skirt, the skirt!). She could still hear Ash's voice from behind the curtain.

"Trinity's taking her anger out on me. Which pisses me off because I haven't done anything. I had a brother you know, he was a complete prick, but I loved him."

Ginger's confused voice interrupted Ash.

"You had a brother?"

Sierra pulled back the curtains, now fully dressed. Iseult, it seemed, was a much faster dresser than Sierra and was now sitting on one of the bed's glancing from Ash to Ginger and back again. Ash threw her hands in the air in irritation.

"For gods sake! Just leave it ok?" she shot a meaningful look at Ginger "And I highly doubt Trinity will want to talk about it either. So don't even try."

Ash left the room followed soon by Ginger, who had completely forgotten about the Ashfae/Trinity matter and was now ranting about the favourites to win the Quidditch Cup.

Iseult looked at Sierra with one eyebrow raised,

"That was strange. I wonder what happened to Ash's brother..." she trailed off in thought, then bought herself back "Anyway we should be getting down to breakfast. We're already about ten minutes late."

Sierra smirked,

"Do you ever NOT think about food."

Iseult pretended to think and answered

"No, I don't think I do."

Giggling, the girls left the room and walked down the stair case to the now deserted Gryffindor common room. They made their way down to the Great Hall, talking about the benefits of cable television in the muggle world ("Well you see," Iseult pointed out "Muggles don't have duels between angry witches to pass the time, cable must be just as entertaining to them." "Entertaining, yeah. But at least with cable you don't get knocked out")

They walked over to the Gryffindor table for breakfast. Sirius and James moved aside and made places for them. Sierra made to go over there but Iseult grabbed her firmly by the arm and pulled her further along the table to where Ashfae and Trinity were glaring at each other from opposite sides of the table. They sat down next to Ginger and Sierra shot a questioning look at Iseult, who ignored her and started eating her waffles.

"Timetables." Said Ginger, passing each of them a piece of parchment "Defence Against the Dark Arts first."

"No!" wailed Sierra, taking her timetable and staring at it with disgust "Is it really necessary to subject me to such torture so early in the morning?"

"Yes." said Iseult, pouring maple syrup in her waffles "It provides much entertainment to us. Why are you so upset anyway? Defence is a great subject. Well it beats Herbology anyway."

Sierra put her head on the table and moaned.

"I'm practically failing Defence, and now, when I just woke up, I have to sit through an hour of it. Life is so unfair. Nasty timetable making teachers." She added loathingly. "I bet they're doing it just to spite me."

Iseult rolled her eyes.

"For gods sake Sierra, the teachers don't have it in for you already. You've got to wait a few more weeks before you can say that."

Sierra ignored her and continued.

"They know I'm related to Justin and Tristan, and this is how they're seeking revenge!" she wailed "Why me? Oh why me?"

"Because your related to Justin and Tristan" pointed out Ashfae most unhelpfully

"Thank you captain obvious!" snapped Sierra in irritation "I wanted you to comfort me, not to tell me the truth."

"Yeah Ashfae," said Trinity sarcastically. She turned to Sierra "SOME people are just too thick to get things like that."

It was Iseult's turn to put her head on the table.

"Not this again." She groaned, "Eew! Aw man?!"

Sierra snorted.

"Serves you right for putting your head on your plate. God you're blonde. It's a simple law of physics that if you put the maple syrup on the waffles then put your head on the waffles your head will then get the maple syrup on it."

Iseult poked her tongue out at Sierra as she wiped the offending syrup off her head.

"Oh yeah that's rich coming from someone who failed Defence Against the Dark Arts."

"Yeah well that wasn't my fault," said Sierra indignantly

"Whatever," Iseult snorted.

Suddenly Trinity shrieked and glared at Ashfae, who was eating her cereal with an air of someone who is completely innocent and has no idea what's going on. Trinity proceeded to pick up an apple and hurl it at Ashfae, whom it hit square on the head. Ashfae stood up, furious.

"That was un called for!"

"Un called for? UNCALLED FOR? YOU KICKED ME!"

"NO I DIDN'T"

"YES YOU DID. I KNOW IT WAS YOU."

"I DIDN'T DO IT AND YOU CAN'T PROVE IT WAS ME" said Ash stubbornly.

"ARGH!"

Trinity shrieked and stomped off, the whole school now watching the display. It was a few more seconds before the normal chatter resumed. Iseult looked at Ash calmly.

"Did you kick her?" she asked

"Yes."

Ginger rolled her eyes

"I thought you were going to STOP provoking her!"

"I never said that."

"Can't you two just get along"

"No," said Ash simply, finishing off her cereal. "And if we don't hurry we're going to be late for Defence."

"Oh joy." Muttered Sierra sarcastically, Iseult grinned, Obviously enjoying Sierra's pain.

"Come on ickle Siewwa. Don't want to miss the bestest class now do we?"

Sierra shot Iseult an evil look,

"You bloody lucky I like you right now Peregrine, however you might not be so lucky soon."

Iseult just laughed and finished her waffles.

_**Iseult**_.

"So, when does Defence start?"

Ash glanced at her timetable lazily.

"Nine O'clock."

Ginger yawned beside Iseult, who was busy clearing the remains of sticky maple syrup out of her hair with various charms.

"Good. That's...yawn...half an hour."

Sierra frowned in mock sadness and rolled her eyes.

"Damn, I was hoping to get to it earlier."

Iseult frowned sideways at Sierra. She could not quite see why Sierra hated Defence so much...however the fact that she was failing it might have been a factor.

"Maybe it'll be different at Hogwarts?" she tried to console her friend, though not believing her own words.

"What's the teacher like?" she asked Ginger who was evidently sick of Ashfae's ranting and was listening to Sierra and Iseult.

"No idea. New this year. Last teacher was an old auror, and, well...he had an accident, lets say."

Sierra and Iseult were both a little shocked, and Sierra was about to open her mouth when a very heavy, very fat and extremely feathery ball landed in her lap.

"Finally, the post!" Ginger said beside Iseult, who was preoccupied in an attempt to get the overly large owl off Sierra.

Above their heads an assortment of packages were being dropped in laps around the hall by a variety of species of owls. The tawny brown and grey owl firmly weighted down on Sierra's lap was carrying a carefully addressed letter and small package from her brothers and Danielle. When she had finally taken the owl's charge off it, and screamed,

"GET AWAY YOU BLOODY...CHICKEN!" for some reason, a few times, the bird finally flew up to the rafters in a most disgruntled manner.

As Sierra opened her parcel, Iseult looked around, and felt quite unloved as she saw that almost everyone else had a parcel except her.

"Oh." She sighed. _'Mummy and Dad would send me something if they could. Maybe I should write to grandmere? Tell her that I'm feeling lonely...'_

Sierra groaned as the group of Gryffindors bustled into the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. They ducked underneath its overhanging arches into the main area of the class. The five girls – Ashfae, Trinity, Ginger, Sierra and Iseult, all took places in the back row of the arches of desks, the first two as far away as possible from each other, although Ash still managed to taunt Trin from across the room.

Once the Gryffindors had organised themselves and most people had arrived, they were left talking in an almost empty room, apart from a semi-circle of rows of desks along one side; there was absolutely no furniture, and no teacher. The two class clowns (Yes, you know who) were taking advantage of this, and had started turning transfiguring certain people's desks into huge vegetables, turning them back, and then denying everything completely. This was obviously very funny if it was not happening to you, but the thing was that they were really picking on people, especially James who seemed to be the better spell caster by far. At first Iseult had thought that they were doing it to everybody, just to be funny, they even did it to each other a few times, but after a while...

"Have you noticed...they've turned that red haired guy's desk into a carrot at least four times!" Iseult hissed at Sierra, who was sitting between Ginger and Iseult on the far side of the back row with the rest of the group.

Sierra nodded vigorously, scowling. "Have you seen how many times they tried to do it to Aless? He blocked all the spells, but that's bullying!" Iseult nodded in disgust.

"They're worse in public, aren't they? Typical." She muttered. "Typical assholes." Iseult looked back at Sierra now, who was clenching her fists menacingly under her desk and evidently considering playing one of her "angry-bitch" moods, now infamous all over Hogwarts it seemed, from the things that the Slytherins had muttered under their breath in the halls this morning. Iseult patted her hand nervously. As much as it would be nice to see the boys get some well-deserved punishment for being bullies, Iseult didn't think that Sierra really wanted more of a reputation as a bitch. Well... Iseult looked at her friend nervously. You could never tell with Sierra. And the teacher didn't seem any closer to arriving.

_**Sierra**_

Sierra felt like she was going to explode. Well, not exactly explode... but hit someone in the very least. And she was quite sure who that someone was going to be. But what really got to her was the fact that Iseult was trying to stop her. What was that all about? Didn't Iseult want to see them with a serious blood nose as much as Sierra did? Apparently not.

This pissed Sierra off royally. Iseult was on her side. So naturally she should want her to seriously disfigure James and Sirius' faces.

"I swear to god I'm going to kill one of them soon..." muttered Sierra angrily.

"Don't." Iseult advised

"Why not, it's because you like him don't you!?"

Iseult looked shocked, then angry.

"I DO NOT LIKE HIM." She shouted

The whole class turned and looked at Iseult, including Ashfae, who was in the middle of charming one of Trinity's books so that they followed her around hitting her.

"Yes you do!" said Sierra, happy to get the attention of the class "That's why you wouldn't let me hit him. You like him and you don't want to admit it."

Sierra grinned, she knew perfectly well she was right. Apart from the fact that Iseult had been positively glowing after dancing with James, she had now gone a shade of red even Godric Griffindor would have been proud to wear.

"Yeah, well..." Iseult paused, trying to think of a suitable comeback "You like _him_."

"No I don't"

"Yes you do!"

"I don't. I like..." Sierra looked round the class for a worthy candidate "I like Remus." She said haughtily.

Half the classes mouths dropped open, Sierra smirked at Iseult.

"You so do not." Iseult said angrily

"I do!" insisted Sierra "I'll kiss him to prove it."

Remus looked petrified and inched towards the door.

"Fine! Fine, do it then. But I think we all know who you really want to kiss." Said Iseult scathingly

Ashfae leaned over to Ginger,

"Uh, Ging... who does she want to kiss?"

"For gods sake, I DON'T KNOW!" whispered Ginger, throwing her hands in the air. "I'm not psychic you know."

Sierra glared at Iseult.

"I will then."

"Good."

"And I'll enjoy every moment."

"You do that."

"I will."

"Fine."

"Fine."

"Fine."

"FINE." Sierra half shouted.

She turned around and looked for Remus, who was standing frozen a few meters from the door. He looked from Sierra to Sirius and back to Sierra again, terrified. Sirius looked perfectly calm, although his fist was clenched around his wand so tightly that his knuckles were turning white. Sierra strode purposefully over to Remus, who tried to run away, but she grabbed him by the arm and looked at him sternly, in a way quite reminiscent of McGonagall. He began to protest, trying to work his arm out of her grasp.

"Now shut up and stand still. Or I'll accidentally spit on you."

"Oh yeah, big turn on there." muttered Iseult sarcastically.

"That goes for you too." Said Sierra darkly.

"I'm so scared," muttered Iseult again "I'm just so terrified"

Sierra ignored her and grabbed Remus by the other arm. He was still pulling away. "FOR GODS SAKE STAND STILL!" she shouted at him, he froze, stunned.

"That's better." She said and leaned forward.

She was just about to kiss him when the door swung open.

"Not interrupting anything am I?" said the amused voice.

Sierra let go of Remus in shock and turned round. She looked innocently at the teacher, her hands behind her back.

"No, of course not." She said to the teacher.

She turned to go back to her seat and shot Remus a dark look.

"I'm not finished with you yet..." she whispered, just loud enough so that the teacher wouldn't hear.

Remus gulped and looked horrified. Sierra skipped back to her desk, exchanging a sour glance with Iseult when she sat down. The teacher, who looked had a rather self-satisfied look on his face (Sierra wondered if it was permanent) put a pile of papers on his desk, and proceeded to organise it.

Iseult was scribbling things angrily on a piece of parchment, and glaring at James' back.

The class sat relatively quieltly waiting for the teacher. Well, as quiet as any class could get with Sirius and James in it. Actually the whole class was quiet, they were too busy charming Ashfae's laces on her sports shoes to tie together.

Finally the teacher stood up and peered out over the class. Sierra shifted slightly in her seat

_'Great!'_ She thought to herself _'just perfect. Not only is this the most evil subject, but we have a horrible teacher. Plus Iseult hates me. What a way to start the school year!'_

She glanced briefly at Iseult, who was staring at the teacher and pursing her lips angrily. Sierra briefly considered flicking a quill at her, but decided against it.

"Now," said the teacher, smiling his self-satisfied smile "I hope that we will be able to have a good year together, as student and teacher."

Most of the students rolled their eyes at this, but the teacher ignored them and moved on.

"My name is Professor Torus and we will be studying a range of subjects this year, including ghosts."

"Ghosts?" said Sirius disbelievingly "Are you serious? That's babies work!" Suprisingly, the teacher laughed loudly.

"Yes, yes Mr." Torus trailed off, waiting for Sirius to introduce himself.

"Black"

"Yes, Mr Black. We will be doing ghosts. Particularily malevolent ghosts."

The class needed a small introduction to the word 'malevolent' before Torus could continue. Torus then proceeded to write some names of malevolent ghosts, encouraging the class to contribute. There were many names being shouted out, including 'Peeves!'.

"Ghosts scare me." One student commented idly.

There were a few murmurs of agreement, Ashfae grinned happily.

"Ghosts don't scare me. Ugly people do." She then proceeded to point at Trinity, screaming loudly.

The class laughed, excluding Trinity, who glared at Ashfae from where she was perched upon the book that had been hitting her for the past five minutes.

The class calmed down after a good few minutes, however Torus continued laughing loudly. Iseult and Sierra exchanged sceptical looks, before Iseult remembered that she hated Sierra and continued snubbing her.

Sierra got the picture that Defence Against the Dark Arts was going to be slightly more interesting...

_**Iseult**_

Iseult looked around the classroom haughtily as the teacher stopped laughing and started to scribble notes on the chalkboard in spidery script. Next to her, Sierra was inspecting her nails and making sideways glares in Iseult's direction every few moments. Iseult ignored her and squinted at the teacher's handwriting, almost as illegible as her own, which was now covering the blackboard in what seemed to be a scrawled description of how to identify a malevolent ghost. Iseult read it briefly and was about to lean over to Sierra and make a comment about how she would distinguish a malevolent ghost-the one trying to kill you-when she again thought better of it, and of what Sierra had just declared previously. She turned back and looked straight ahead, coughing to mask a snigger as she noticed that Professor Torus – who couldn't have been over thirty-five, was hiding his bald-patch, with an obvious, dark, muggle-style toupee. It flopped as he turned around, the class sniggering at him, much as he had consistently laughed at them. He looked around at their smiling faces, surprised, but obviously thinking it was because he was being funny, as he stuck out his chest and walked backwards and forwards in front of the board a few times, before instructing them to copy the paragraph down, his black robe flapping about his ankles.

"We will spend the next few lessons doing written theory before we get on to the practicals...the juicy stuff." He said, still strutting as if he was posing for a camera. A groan of indifference came up from the class, who were, like Iseult squinting madly at his handwriting, which was amazingly difficult to read.

"The first practical will involve an excursion round Hogwarts, interviewing and comparing the various ghosts, and sorting the malevolent from the benevolent...that means the opposite of malevolent." He said, obviously quite disappointed that the class didn't appreciate his use of big words, which he had been saving for such an occasion as this. Iseult rolled her eyes at the vocabularies of some of the pupils in her class. She was playing with her quill absentmindedly as Professor Torus droned on, until a flash out the window caught her eye, and she gazed outside for a second. When she turned back to her desk, she reached for her quill, and grasped nothing but air. She took a glance at the floor and, seeing nothing, was utterly confused, until she saw a single drop of ink fall from above her, and her eyes turned upward, nervously. The quill, was floating...

Iseult instantly looked sideways in suspicion at Sierra, the obvious candidate for charming her quill. But Iseult's...friend who she had a grudge on at present, appeared to be trying very hard not to think about Iseult at all, and was instead staring pointedly in the opposite direction. Iseult looked back up at her airborne quill, which had continued dripping black ink all over the floor. As she inspected the growing black puddle on the floor beside her desk, she heard a snigger from the other side of the arch of desks. Peter was brandishing a wand and coaxing the feather-quill upward, slowly directing it towards the front of the classroom. Iseult opened her mouth in annoyance and mild shock, and glared at the freckly boy with malicious eyes. His accomplice, James, was grinning smugly and snickering behind his hands, while Sirius sat and glared at Remus. Iseult looked at them all stonily, but now that most of the class had taken in the ink-soaked, dripping quill hovering towards the teacher, the boys were so intent on basking in the attention that they didn't notice her.

Iseult glanced across at Sierra who was staring deeply into the puddle of black ink, and every now and then looking backwards, contemplating whether to punch Pettigrew, or help him annoy Iseult and make the rest of her things fly. Iseult was having a similar battle of mind – to attack or not to attack – for although Peter was definitely making the lesson a lot more interesting, he was using her quill...

In these few minutes that Iseult's quill had been dripping ink all over his classroom and slowly moving towards him, Professor Torus had not noticed anything unusual. He was quite a short man, and despite the platform shoes he wore, he would had to have craned his neck quite dangerously to notice the feathery airborne pen that was now somersaulting above his head, and even if he had been taller, he was too busy posing and strutting and talking about the origins of Norse ghost stories to bother looking up. Which was a mistake considering what Peter Pettigrew was planning to do.

_**Sierra  
**_  
Under normal circumstances, Sierra would have gladly re-arranged Peter's face. But these weren't normal circumstances. For one thing, it would involve helping Iseult – something in which she was determined would not happen. It would also involve going back to boring note writing, and a possible detention. Plus the other members of the class would kill her; they were all staring at the quill avidly. With the exception of Trinity, who was too busy controlling the flying-hitting book, which was rapidly becoming out of control, and Ashfae, who was busy charming the book to be out of control.

Sierra returned her attention to the quill, which was flying slowly forward. Reaching Professor Torus it gently flicked the toupee off his head, and lightly drew a smiley face.

You would have thought that the professor would have at least felt the scratching of the quill on his head, much less notice the fact that the whole class was snickering. But no, Torus continued to drone on and on. Which kind of made the whole thing utterly pointless.

Soon the class fell back into their yawning stupor, a few of the students actually listening.

By the time Defence had ended, Sierra had learnt a grand total of... nothing. Which really wasn't that surprising, when you looked at her past achievements in the subject. As soon as the bell signalling end of class rang, everyone stood up. Including Ashfae, who fell flat on her face again, and gave Sirius the finger.

However Ash soon got over it, after untying her shoelaces, and skipped out of the class snickering loudly. Sierra could only guess that it was about the fact that Trinity still hadn't managed to de-charm the book to stop hitting her.

Sierra checked her timetable, Arithmancy next. Well, on the upside Iseult had Ancient Runes – not Arithmancy. Which meant she wouldn't have to be ignored by her for another period. Actually, the only Gryffindors in the Arithmancy class were Remus, Alessandro, Ashfae and another couple of random people whom Sierra hadn't met. Sierra hurried up a bit, to keep up with Alessandro and Remus. She pushed in between them. The two boys were having a serious discussion about something she had no idea about. Which meant that it was only one of many, many things. Remus shied away when Sierra pushed through. She grinned at them.

"Yay!" she said happily, "Arithmancy! My best subject!"

Alessandro looked at her sceptically.

"You have a best subject?" he scoffed "You mean, there's a subject that you DON'T fail?"

She scowled and kicked him hard on the shin. Alessandro yelled and started hopping up and down, holding his shin and yelling,

"OWOWOWOWOWOW!" loudly.

Sierra grinned smugly and linked arms with Remus, (who tried to escape – unsuccessfully) walking down the hall with her nose held up in the air. Remus shot an apologetic look at Alessandro, who was busy glaring daggers at Sierra's back.

Upon reaching the Arithmancy classroom. Sierra practically dragged Remus to a front row seat and ordered him to sit down.

"Uh, no... I better sit with Aless..."

"SIT DOWN NOW" she demanded loudly.

Remus gulped, and quickly sat down. She smiled sweetly and sat down next to him, flicking her hair behind her shoulder and arranging her books on her desk, looking like the perfect little angel.

Alessandro came in a bit later, glared at Sierra and sat across the isle from Remus. Sierra waved happily and winked at him.

"Bitch..." he mumbled under his breath.

"I'm sorry," she said loudly "I didn't quite catch that Alessandro... can you repeat that?"

He glared at her, exhaling slowly.

"I said, you're a bitch."

"Oh I know that." Sierra replied matter-of-factly

Remus gulped and looked away, shooting a scared look at Alessandro. Sierra snickered and Alessandro shrugged very slightly, feeling the pain of his friend.

Neither of them said anything as the teacher walked in. She was short, fat and wore bright red robes with a matching tie. She glared at the class, and especially at Sierra, who shrunk a bit into her chair. Evil teacher.

The teacher walked to her desk and practically threw the pile of papers she was holding onto it with a loud 'thump'. Sierra jumped slightly, but it seemed that the rest of the class already knew her.

The teacher moved to in front of Sierra's desk, glaring at her. Remus felt slightly sorry for Sierra, who looked absolutely petrified.

"I," the teacher screeched at Sierra, showering her in spit "am Professor Blumenfeld. My real name is Ninny Blumenfeld. But you don't need to know that because you won't be calling me by my given name, which is Ninny."

Sierra wondered why the teacher was telling her this, it seemed that she was quite thick. She definitely looked it.

The professor then proceeded to glare at each person in the class one by one. The class, however, seemed quite used to it. Remus leaned across toward Sierra slightly. "She does this every lesson," he hissed under his breath "We think it might be to intimidate us. Don't worry about it, you get used to it."

Sierra snorted under her breath, glad that Remus was at least talking to her. The Professor soon finished glaring at the class and walked back to the whiteboard.

"Now. What is your name, New Person?" she screeched, showering Remus with spit. Sierra discreetly passed him a tissue, which he took gratefully.

"Sierra Rehine." She said innocently

The professor glared at her, untrusting. Sierra smiled sweetly, batting her long eyelashes.

"Right. Miss Rehine. My name is Professor Blumenfeld. But my real name is Ninny Blumenfeld, not Professor. As Professor would be a stupid thing to name a child. Unless one was sure that said child would become a professor. However this cannot be done as my parents were sure that I was to become a model, however I was too interested in teaching."

During this speech Sierra and Remus were inevitably showered with spit. Sierra mentally rolled her eyes, this professor really WAS stupid. Not only did she have some kind of speech impediment but she had already said practically the same thing just a few minutes ago.

She vaguely wondered how Iseult was doing in her class...

_**Iseult**_

"Exactly why they took ancient runes is beyond me." Ginger muttered loudly to Iseult and Trin, who were positioned on either side of her in the runes classroom. Iseult nodded and glared sideways at the offending trio of Sirius, Peter and James perched on a table at the opposite side of the room.

"I wish they hadn't. Or I hadn't." she said as she calmly scrawled pictures in her parchment notebook. Trinity leaned over and started choking with laughter.

"What are you drawing?" Ging said nosily, grabbing the notebook from Iseult's desk. She raised her eyebrows as Iseult giggled.

"Its my illustration of the hopeful demise of James, Peter and Sirius."

"In that order?"

"...Yes"

"Who's the person waving the wand?" Trinity added, piping up.

"Me... I can't draw." She added in explanation.

"Oh...and why are Peter, James and Sirius growing pink broccoli?"

"Those are umbrellas...It would be painful to sprout umbrellas!" she protested in a whisper to Ginger, who was rolling her eyes.

"Right. You are strange, Iseult." Ginger added as the teacher walked inside.

The teacher walked in nervously, a bent old wizard who looked to Iseult, more than a little mad.

"Mrai Nam ees Profezzor Veltzer. I vill be teaching you Ankient Runes dis year. Dis year ve vill be coverting..." he droned on, and on, and on. Apart from the initial curiosity of his accent, the students soon lost all interest in their wizened Professor, and moved on from listening to his start-of-year lecture to chatting among themselves. Iseult was adding Professor Veltzer to her picture so he could bore the three boys to death. Ginger and Trin had moved on to an in-depth discussion on the topic of Muggle films,(Why did they always seem to have an Elvis in them? What was an Elvis? Was it some sort of elf?) when Iseult felt a thud on the side of her neck. She leaned back, looked down, and rolled her eyes at the scrunched up sheet of parchment lying behind her chair. Iseult turned and looked up, to see James smiling coolly on the other edge of the room. She groaned and picked it up, unscrunching the cream paper out onto her desk.

'

Iseult didn't read the rest. She was too busy stabbing it with her wand, trying to make it burst into flames, to notice the fine details like the actual message. She was starting to realise why her brother had told her it was suicide to take Ancient Runes. In Iseult's mind, the only point in learning obscure alphabets would be so that you could send messages about the death and torture of certain annoying people in your year to other people who felt the same way. However, seeing as said person who felt the same way as Iseult, A-did not take runes, and B-probably hated her, Iseult was considering switching subjects.

Iseult got a total of about six notes thrown at her that lesson, and she very proudly burnt them all under her desk, while the teacher, who must have been half deaf, scribbled away at the blackboard. She made sure to keep the charred remains of as many of these as she could. Iseult considered all this a necessary step she must take if she wanted to be reconciled with Sierra. Which she did. She used the time in the lesson she had that was not spent burning unread notes, drawing new torture methods and scribbling down Runes notes, to write a long and rambling apology letter.

I would like to reinstate my claim that I hate said prick-James Potter, with a burning fury that overcomes many things.

In other words-

James (I assume, seeing as Pettigrew is apparently gay according to Ging and Sirius is after you) threw, most uncharmingly, these notes at me during Runes, which was bloody boring I can assure you, and they are now burnt to small crisp-assuming bits of parchment. It looked like expensive parchment too. Had a watermark. ANYWAY-I did not even read these notes, the most I read was enough to deduce that it was the prick who was sending these, and that was – "We have Quidditch practice tomorrow."

So, this is also a letter to tell you that we have quidditch practice tomorrow, and I assume it is in the afternoon.

Anyway, the evidence (crisp-like parchment scraps) is attached below, as you can see, along with a very bad drawing that I believe you will find amusing. Or hope you will anyway. It is labelled because I cannot draw. In explanation-Don't you think it would be painful to sprout umbrellas? Olive had a dream about sprouting umbrellas once and according to him it was terribly painful, so that is where I got my idea.

Ging is reading over my shoulder and she said that I should tell you that she said (phew) that I have been very busy all lesson devising ways to torture prick and his friends, but she doesn't know why I bother because he isn't that bad really...(Her words not mine)

(At that point I started attacking Ging with my sharp quill and Trin helped me because she said that she was on the quidditch team with him and knows how bad he and Sirius can be. Trin is so great!)

Being annoyed with you is really boring and tiring and if you want me to play some huge trick on J.P (James the Prick hehehe) to prove my eternal loathing, then that is fine with me and it would actually be quite fun-lets do it together!

I am now going to go and madly plot trick ideas.

But would that be sinking down to their level?

I don't think we could sink that low.

Hmm.

Will have to ponder.

Really hope you are not mad at me anymore.,

Is.

_**Sierra**_

Iseult handed the letter to Sierra during break, after that period, a nervous smirk frozen on her face. Sierra sniffed and took it, turning on her heel and following after Ashfae, who was giggling with Ginger over Blumenfeld. The next class was double Divination, which was quite ok. The trio walked up to Divination with Ashfae and Trinity close behind, following somewhat nervously.

They reached the divination classroom, but only after Ashfae had grabbed Gingers 'Dolly' magazine and began whacking her with it. Apparently Ashfae didn't really want to hear about Elijah Wood peeing in a Wellington fountain. Nor, apparently did she want Trinity to stand behind her.

Ash and Ginger crawled up into the trapdoor of the divination classroom, with Trinity glaring daggers at Ashfae's back. The five got a table in the centre of the room, Sierra couldn't believe how hot it was in the classroom, and took off her robe, laying it over the back of her armchair – ignoring the subsequent wolf-whistles from Sirius as he entered the classroom.

She opened Iseult's letter and read it haughtily, suppressing the urge to burst into fits of laughter. She erased it and scribbled her own message.

Yes, I forgive you. To be honest I wasn't really that mad at you in the first place. But anyhow... Yay! You really have to tell me your ideas for pranking those little shitheads. But can we lay off Remus? I sat next to him during Arithmancy and he was really nice. Plus he's like a really cute little fluffy bunny that you just want to pick up and give him a hug.

Sierra read it over, with Ashfae reading over her shoulder. Ash grabbed the parchment and scribbled on the bottom.

Your Good Friend and Hogwarts Torturer,

Sierra snorted and folded the piece of parchment up neatly, looking up just in time to see Iseult telling Sirius and James that,

"NO! YOU CANNOT SIT THERE."

Sirius and James were about to reply when the teacher walked into the room.

She was tall and had blonde hair that fell down to below her waist. Ashfae rolled her eyes and hit her head with her hand, there was also various groans from the female members of the class. The boys, however, were grinning and greeting the teacher happily. Sierra shoved the piece of parchment towards Iseult, and looked towards the front as the teacher was introducing herself.

To be honest, Divination hadn't been altogether that bad. Unlike Defence. Sierra was now sitting happily in the common room while Alessandro was doing her homework. He was making exasperated comments every now and then, something about how Sierra would never pass 3rd Year should it not be for him.

Suddenly he sat up and thrust the parchment at her, scowling slightly.

"There! Take it! And don't expect me to be doing it ever again."

Sierra threw her arms around him and hugged him happily.

"Yay! Thank you! I could kiss you right now," she paused and grinned evilly "But I don't think CJ would like that..."

Aless laughed, and a voice piped up from behind them.

"I'll kiss you Si!"

Sierra turned round and glared at Sirius.

"The only thing you will ever kiss of mine, Sirius Black," she said coldly "Is my ass. Now please leave me alone, so I will never have to talk to you ever again."

He stood up and turned round, crossing his arms coolly.

"Tell me, Sierra. Just what is exactly so wrong with James and I that you and Iseult refuse to even talk to us let alone go out with us?"

Sierra rolled her eyes.

"You are egotistical pricks."

"And how do you know that? You've only known us for what, 4 days?"

Sierra paused, and opened her mouth to say something. Then closed it,

_'Oh bloody hell...'_ she thought to herself.

The whole truth was, she didn't really have anything against the pair. But she tended to be what one might call a 'follower', so because Iseult had decided that Sirius and James were egotistical pricks and she didn't like them, Sierra didn't either.

She suddenly stood up and threw her hair behind her shoulder.

"Goodnight!" she said happily, waving goodnight to them.

She walked over to the staircase leading to the girls dorms, and began to climb it, ignoring Sirius' shouts of "YOU DIDN'T BLOODY ANSWER MY QUESTION!"

She crossed the hall to the dorm, and opened the door. There Iseult was laying on her bed, reading the book Danielle had given to Sierra. Sierra drifted over to Iseult's bed to read over her shoulder, which she did so for at least an hour, until Ashfae noisily stood up and announced she was going to bed, then suggested Trinity do so because she obviously needed her beauty sleep.

It took Ginger at least another ten minutes to break up the fight that ensued, but everyone managed to get to bed in the end. Except for Iseult who was determined to finish at least chapter ten by the time she went to sleep.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** Thanks for reading! Please continue to do so... chapters will be coming a little less often (I'd say about one or two per week) now because of impending exams etc. On the bright side, at least I don't have to memorise any more scripts for Drama! YAY!

**_DISCLAIMER:_** My pen has run out of ink, so as usual, I own nothing.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven: Lies and Picnics**

_**Sierra**_

For Sierra and Iseult, the week had past relatively quickly. The classes had been quite good, and the majority of teachers were normal.

Well, as normal as teachers come anyhow.

Sierra woke up early on Saturday, listening to Ginger reading articles from her muggle magazine aloud.

She got up and opened the curtains, nodding at both Ash and Ging, who were too busy with the magazine to notice her. Iseult, however, was just finishing the last few chapters of Sierra's book, and seemed to be totally captivated by it.

Sierra sat beside her and started yawning and biting her nails, a dirty habit she couldn't get out of no matter what she tried. At least she didn't pick her nose... A few minutes later Ash and Ginger stood up.

"We're going to breakfast." Ashfae announced. "See you there."

To Sierra's amazement, the girls were dressed and ready, even Iseult, who put down the book and looked at her watch.

"Yeah, I'll head down too."

"Okay," Sierra shrugged "I'll meet you guys down there."

She turned back to her trunk as the trio walked out of the room.

"I'd get out of there before Trinity wakes up!" called Ash, giggling

Sierra looked over to where Trinity was sleeping. The curtain was pulled back and Trinity's hand was dangled over the side of the bed into a bowl of water. Sierra figured it must have been warm, as there was a large dark patch on Trin's sheets.

'Poor Trin...' Sierra thought to herself, shaking her head and turning to the trunk. She picked out a black halter neck, and a skirt that was slightly longer than her school one.

She changed into them relatively quickly, keen to get away from Trinity's wrath as soon as possible.

When she was finished, she hurried out of the room, and into the great hall, ignoring Sirius, who was pointing to a saved seat next to him. She felt a bit embarrassed really, after that night, the pair had talked and struck up a bit of a friendship. However whenever she was around Iseult she ignored him as much as possible.

It was a hard situation, on one hand she didn't want to get Iseult pissed off with her, but she really did kind of like Sirius.

Even if he was a sexist creep.

She sat down next to Iseult, and across from Ash and Ginger. Ashfae was piling up her plate with bacon, grinning at it maliciously and singing "I love bacon, I love pork, run little piggy 'coz I've got a fork!" loudly.

Iseult shook her head at Ash and rolled her eyes, pouring some milk onto her cornflakes. She turned to Sierra.

"God, those two have been such dicks today."

Sierra could feel her cheeks burning,

"Uh, really?"

However, Iseult didn't seem to notice.

"Yeah, Sirius in particular. He was making up all these lies about how you'd shown him how to do Arithmancy."

"Eh?" said Sierra guiltily, truth be told, she had indeed shown him how to do simple Arithmancy last night, while Iseult had gone to the kitchen to steal hot chocolate.

"Yeah," Iseult continued "And he's even made himself believe it. Really."

Sierra was sure her face was beet red. Bugger.

Iseult turned to her, slightly suspicious.

"Are you okay?" she said, feeling Sierra's forehead "You look a bit sick..."

"Uh," said Sierra "Yeah..."

She trailed off, and started a completely random conversation with Ash.

_**Iseult**_

Iseult was quite worried for her friend. She cocked her head, wondering if Sierra could perhaps be suffering from some sort of fever, as she was unusually red, and possibly hallucinating. She crunched on her mouthful of cornflakes and twisted her hair round her finger pensively. Turning round to face Trin, eyes shut in thought, she said gloomily,

"Is our Runes work due Monday or...Trin? Where's Trin, guys?"

Iseult gulped as she heard Ashfae giggle insanely from the other side of the table. She then winced as she heard a familiar groan behind her. Ashfae giggled even more.

"Sleep well, Trinity?" Ash said nonchalantly to the figure fuming beside Iseult. Iseult twirled around and grabbed Trin's wrist, pulling her down onto the bench beside her.

"Ash, you are a Class A bitch sometimes." Iseult said disapprovingly as Ash and Trin glared each other down from opposite sides of the table, both gripping their wands menacingly.

"I don't suppose you two could just eat your breakfast without attacking each other this morning?" Ginger nodded, her foot jammed firmly on top of Ashfae's.

"No, thank you." Ashfae said brightly.

"This is Sport." Trinity hissed, glaring at Ash madly.

Sierra shrugged. "At least they agree on something! It's a change!"

Iseult smirked at the look on Trinity and Ashfae's faces as Si said this, a look of utter horror at being tricked into sharing something resembling harmony.

"Good." She shrugged. "That's a start. Now could someone pass me the apple juice?"

The rest of breakfast passed in an unusual state of amity. For once, Trinity didn't walk off in an angry sulk, and the girls managed to eat their breakfast in relative peace. After the owl post arrived, from which Iseult received a tin of chocolate biscuits from her grandmother and a box of coconut ice from her friend Stephanie back in Beauxbatons (stolen from the famous Beauxbatons kitchens no doubt) each package carried in by a pair of butch-looking barn owls, Iseult and Sierra heard a loud, rough cough from behind them, and both turned to see Jacques standing there, looking at the ceiling.

"Oh...Hi?" Si stammered quickly, startled.

"We have Quidditch practice at three."

"Hi...Three?" Iseult shook her head, confused at his frankness. He ignored her completely and addressed Sierra.

"Until five. Bring your broom."

Trin, who had been mostly silent all breakfast, broke in, scoffing.

"Unlikely. If I know Will, he'll drag it on for another extra hour at least."

Si and Iseult looked up at Jack sceptically, but he had reverted to staring at the ceiling again. He looked down finally and rolled his eyes, nodding.

"Ok, then. Bye Sierra, bye Trinity. See you at practice." He gave his surprised smile, and sauntered off down the table. Iseult stared at his back open mouthed.

"Have I gone insane, or does he hate me?"

The girls nodded in pity.

"But...I'm so nice!" She protested, shaking her head in disbelief.

"I'm not sure about that, but you're definitely nicer than him." Sierra shook her head sincerely as Iseult glared at her sarcastically. "I am quite curious as to what James would have been telling him. Maybe he's scared of James? Like David Jones?"

They turned as Trin coughed argumentatively.

"Puh-lease. James isnt that tough, and not everyone worships him like the idiots in our year. I know Jack well, and he isnt likely to be scared of James." Trin chuckled. "Probably vice-versa actually. Anyway, stop flattering yourself, the two of you. You aren't that great that Sirius and James are going to go around beating up anyone who looks at you. Calm down. They only liked you because you were new anyway." Trin rolled her eyes and flipped her bob of hair out of her face. Neatly, she dabbed her mouth with her napkin and stood up, following the growing trail of students who were heading back to their dorms. Iseult and Sierra looked at each other in a state of mild shock.

"Was that supposed to be reassuring?" Iseult said, putting her spoon down and blinking at her empty bowl as it disappeared. She looked at Sierra, who was contemplating Trinity's words.

"Or insulting. Hard to tell with Trin." Si said slowly, nodding her head lamely.

"Well..." started Iseult, stopping suddenly as she heard the mention of "Runes homework". "Well," she continued, eager to distract herself from the disaster imminent on Monday morning, "what should we do until quidditch practice?"

Sierra nodded exaggeratedly. "Good point. Should we see what CJ and Steph are doing?"

They turned as they heard a cough behind them and Aless appeared, making no attempt to hide the fact that he had been eavesdropping.

"Oh? What are you doing, and can I come?" he said, sitting down beside Iseult in the spot Trin had recently vacated. Iseult turned to him, a look of bemusement struck across her face.

"I suppose you know exactly what CJ is planning to do today?"

Aless shrugged innocently. "No...Yes...They're having a picnic on the far side of the lake with food from the kitchens." He uttered after a while.

Iseult smiled with an air of brilliance.

"See, Sierra, we'll picnic with them before going to Quidditch practice."

Iseult leaned back on the bench, almost making it tip back and send Alessandro and Sierra flying backwards with her. Tilting her head back, she stayed in a bent position until finally springing back up, and asking Aless quietly,

"Why is the ghost only semi-decapitated?"

"He's Nearly-Headless-Nick!"

"What the...why?"

"I think the axe was blunt."

"My great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather was executed in the French revolution, and the blade still had King Louis' blood on it and he was so excited that he would have regal blood in his veins before he died."

Sierra and Alessandro paused for a moment waiting to hear if the joyful tone in Iseult's voice meant it was a joke. The punch line didn't come, so Sierra murmured cautiously,

"Oh, that's terrible, Iseult."

Iseult frowned, earnestly quite confused.

"Its ok, he didn't mind. He haunted his executioner's family home for a decade until his wife demanded he come home, so he did, and he's been living in the house ever since. He scared all my muggle friends at my seventh birthday party by juggling his head."

Her friends nodded meekly, wondering if they had missed out on a vital part of childhood because they didn't have their long-dead great-grandfather to act the clown at their birthday parties. A glimpse of Sir Nicholas showing an interested first year his decapitated neck was enough to assure them otherwise.

"So...Sierra, are you alright?"

Sierra was quickly gulping down a glass of punch in order to stop Iseult seeing her smile at Sirius, who was waving at her steadily.

"Yeah, Yeah, just thirsty, that's all. I need to go and get changed into a different skirt..." Sierra lied hastily, pulling her legs out from underneath the table and swinging them round to the outside of the bench. Iseult stood up and stepped over the bench delicately, and they both waved to Aless, who saluted them as they left.

The day had turned out to be a scorcher, so Iseult, Sierra and the twins were lying in differing shades of dappled sunlight under a tree on the far side of the lake from the castle. They were sprawled on towels around the tree in various states of drowsiness, when Iseult heard a whistled tune coming towards them. Alessandro romped over to the girls happily, carrying a bottle of butter beer under each arm and a wicker picnic basket proudly emblazoned with the Hogwarts crest. Behind him, Remus was steadily but nervously creeping into the shade of the tree, also carrying a similar picnic basket hooked onto his arm.

"Hallo, have you brought us something from the kitchens?" Iseult said happily, standing up and peering into the basket Aless was carrying. He grinned and plonked his armful of goods down onto Iseult's towel. CJ rolled over from where she was sunbathing and looked up at him.

"Oh, did you bring Remus?" she groaned, sitting up and gesturing for Aless to sit on the towel beside her. Aless nodded and handed her a glass out of the basket and one of the bottles of frothy butter beer.

"No firewhiskey, sorry."

At the mention of that blessed alcohol, Sierra jolted up and looked around.

"Firewhiskey? Who said firewhiskey?"

A consequential yell was let loose as Sierra sat up.

"OI! You didn't tell me she was coming!" Remus protested, glaring at Sierra.

"Hi Remus!" she said happily. It appeared that due to the fact that her and Iseult were no longer fighting, she had no need to flirt with Remus anymore. He sat down slowly, keeping a wary eye on the short brunette.

"Sorry..." he muttered to Sierra, looking down at the picnic basket, abashed. He pulled a bottle out of his own basket, and sipped it slowly. Iseult looked at him suspiciously, but soon forgot about it when Alessandro started handing out the food from the Hogwarts kitchens. Chicken wraps, a pizza, pies, tarts, six pomegranates and all manner of wizarding sweets soon emerged from the two picnic baskets that the house-elves had "so eagerly" packed for the boys. Spreading their banquet out on the grass, they brusquely awoke Stephanie after she started sleep-talking and annoying them all with her murmurs of David Jones's physique.

"Cheers!" Sierra grinned, clinking her full glass of butter beer with Aless's. Consequently, Sierra got butter beer all over her 'Orlando loves me' T-shirt, and swore copiously.

Their feast dwindled until only the dregs of the food were left. Iseult was busy teaching CJ how to eat a pomegranate when a loud squawk from above her made her jump, and fling scarlet pomegranate seeds into the air. A large brown owl glided graciously down to rest upon the handle of Remus's picnic basket, where it dropped a letter, preened its wing feathers for a few seconds, and then swooped off again, flapping its wings powerfully. Iseult grabbed the basket and reached into it to pull out the note. In black ballpoint pen, it read,

'

PLEASE COME TO PRACTICE See you soon,

Deputy

"Its from Nike, saying we have practice." Iseult said drearily, handing the letter to Sierra, who groaned.

"I'd totally forgotten. Do we have to go?" she moaned, lying back into her comfortable position against a tree-root. Iseult nodded glumly.

"Yes, she's pretty insistent...hold on! Remus, why is there a firewhiskey bottle in here?" Iseult cried gleefully, turning to Remus as she pulled the empty bottle out of the picnic basket on her knees. All five of her friends leapt towards her, Remus to hide the evidence, and the rest of them to see if there was any more. Sierra grabbed the bottle from Iseult and tipped it upside down carefully. A single drop trickled down the neck of the bottle and onto the grass. Sierra looked at the spot where it had fallen, as if waiting for a firewhiskey tree to grow beneath her gaze. Suddenly she threw the bottle roughly in Remus's direction, hitting him squarely on the shoulder.

"You could've at least shared it." She groaned. "Come on, Iseult. We need to go to quidditch."

Iseult said goodbye and thank you to the others, before following a fuming Sierra down to the quidditch pitch.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** Alas! A horrible, short chapter in which nothing happens. Ah well. I'm trying to space out all the chapters, because I really don't think I'm going to be able to get a whole load of writing done untill my NCEA exams are over. The mock's are in two weeks (I am so dead, I spent all this weekend looking at Auckland Uni instead of studying so I am royally screwed) and the NCEA's start in November. In better news I might be able to wrangle a bit of writing due to the fact that I handed in my last ever internal last week. Joy of joys. I truly cannot believe that there are to be no more internals for the rest of my life, ever. School has flown by so fast. Anyhow, thankyou to all who have reviewed, please continue doing so. If you want to keep up with me between chapters, add my livejournal which I've recently started updating (It's chocolatesauce) Also my monodrama is on there, so if you want to see me writing in a different context, check it out.

PS: If you do check it out, and think it's wierd... Its in the style of Epic Theatre, its supposed to be wierd ;-)

**_DISCLAIMER:_** I stole a pen from work, so I still technically own nothing. Although does this mean that I own the pen now? I didn't buy it, but my boss did give it to me. I think she may have been expecting it back though so... who knows.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter Twelve: Broom Closets**

_**Sierra**_

Sierra and Iseult wandered down to the quidditch pitch, Sierra in a deathly bad mood. Halfway down they heard Steph calling out to them. They stopped and looked around, to see Steph and Remus running up the path towards them.

"Thanks!" Steph puffed

"Why aren't you with CJ and Aless?" Iseult asked her, slightly suspicious. Remus made a gagging sound and pretended to vomit behind a bush.

"The two love birds back there are doing things that should never be done in public." He said pointedly.

Sierra and Iseult laughed, while Steph and Remus looked grossed out by the mere memory.

They chatted amicably while walking down to the quidditch pitch. However, when they came to it Steph stopped, and looked horrified.

"What is it?" asked Iseult,

Sierra looked, she couldn't really see anything wrong, the entire male proportion of the quidditch team was crowded around a severely under- dressed blonde girl who was giggling at something.

"Oh shit." Groaned Steph "Hamish left last year,"

She looked at Sierra and Iseult sadly.

"Well, then." She laughed stiffly "At least you won't have to worry about James and Sirius bugging you. She'll probably want one of them..."

Sierra grabbed Steph by the shoulders and shook her, trying to get some sense out of her

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?"

"Amber!" said Steph, slightly scared of Sierra. She pointed at the girl "HER! Amber Lee. She was going out with last year's Quidditch captain. She's pretty much Hogwarts excuse for the Wakefield twins. She's in our dorm, and won't even speak to us. We just aren't cool enough" she explained

"So, what's wrong?" asked Iseult, despite being baffled by the Wakefield twins comparison, considering that she was not muggle born and had not been seeped in Sweet Valley High for many of her pre-teen years.

"HER!" shouted Steph, annoyed that they weren't getting her extreme obviousness "SHE CAN GET ANY GUY SHE WANTS, AND SEEING AS SHE'S CURRENTLY SINGLE BECAUSE HER BOYFRIENDS LEFT HOGWARTS, SHE'S OBVIOUSLY GOING AFTER EITHER SIRIUS OR JAMES, DON'T YOU GET THAT?!"

"Oh," said Iseult, a happy look of understanding on her face.

"She can't have any guy she wants" interrupted Remus "She can't have me."

Steph rolled her eyes and patted him on the back

"Remus, no-one WANTS you."

Remus made a rude gesture towards Steph and stormed away.

"What?!" Steph whined at Sierra and Iseult's withering looks "What?! It's TRUE!" Sierra and Iseult rolled their eyes at Steph. They soon reached where the rest of the team were sitting, excluding Nike, who was sitting about two meters away shooting glares at Amber.

Amber was sitting in the middle of the circle of boys, her legs stretched out in the pretense of 'getting a tan'. Not that she needed it, she was beautifully tanned already, Sierra noted with jealousy. Whenever Sierra tried to get a tan, she just ended up red and freckily, not a very good combination. Amber was laughing at something James had said, and rubbing his arm affectionately.

Iseult, who had been watching the same spectacle, whispered in Sierra's ear. "It's almost as if they're having a competition for her affections, look at them!" It was certainly true, the boys were definitely vying for her attention. Making loud comments and laughing loudly at their own jokes. Iseult rolled her eyes.

"It's not as if she's even pretty or anything." She said, although obviously not believing it. Amber was the type of girl who looked pretty whatever she did. She had long waist-lengh blonde hair, which was poker- straight, with matching blue eyes and pouty pink lips.

As the pair walked closer, Nike suddenly noticed them, and jumped up.

"ABOUT TIME!" she shouted, although Sierra could tell that she was relieved. As long as the practice started, Amber would have to leave.

"Sorry!" grinned Iseult, looking at Nike.

Iseult began explaining their lateness to Nike, who wasn't really angry, just pretending to be to look like a good captain. Sierra, however, was completely ignoring Nike, and instead watching Amber out of the corner of her eye.

The girl was quite obviously making spiteful comments about Sierra and Iseult. The rest of the team was steadfastly agreeing with her, and making rude gestures.

_**Iseult**_

As Iseult would explain to Sierra afterwards, Amber must have been jealous of them in some way, because otherwise she probably wouldn't have bothered at all. Or maybe she was just naturally spiteful. But both these assumptions were made long after Iseult first heard the name Amber Lee, because for the moment, most of Iseult's attention was firmly fixed on talking sparkily to Nike, and trying to avoid looking as out-of-place as she felt. Iseult, despite being deep and clever and pretty (in that order) had never, NEVER felt comfortable being around people who looked like they were born to be pin-ups in tiny little white bathing suits. Amber Lee, as Steph had briefly explained, was one of these people. Iseult had only noticed her fleetingly, but had instinctively rushed straight to Nike, in order to act towards Amber like one does when in the presence of someone very embarrassing, that is, avoid eye contact at all costs.

However, after Iseult finished explaining why they were late (she had added in an encounter with the Herbology professor for good measure) Nike was getting impatient and they were both itching to get on brooms, so they reluctantly sauntered over to where Sierra was pretending not to be watching the group gathered around the girl who looked like what muggles called, and Steph referred to as "A Bar-B doll."

"Do you think they're likely to want to play quidditch now?" Nike said sullenly to Sierra, crossing her arms over her broom handle. Sierra paused for a moment, and then shook her head vigorously.

"The conversation has changed from quidditch to her, to the team and then back to her, and before she was asking about the 'two ugly little first years' who were hanging around. I assume she means us?" Sierra whispered in disgust. Iseult rolled her eyes, but Nike just nodded her head and laughed quietly.

"It was almost as bad when she was going out with Hamish, and she and Trinity got into the biggest rows...She's a total bitch, really." Nike added as an after note. "But I am going to at least try to get this lot off the ground." She grumbled, her train of thought quickly switching back to Quidditch. Iseult sighed. She certainly didn't want to be the one to go and tell the boys that they had to stop staring at Amber's legs and get on their brooms.

"...Could one of you call them to get ready?" Nike said, turning towards the changing shed. Sierra and Iseult raised their eyebrows.

"But they're just standing right there!" Sierra pointed out indignantly.

"Well...Well then that makes it all the easier, doesn't it." Nike replied, walking quickly.

"But Ni-kay!" Iseult said, forehead creased. The deputy captain ignored her and continued walking. Iseult sighed, and twirled around to the gaggle of Gryffindors gathered around Amber. She looked at Sierra, who shrugged, and they both sauntered over to the group.

"Hey, guys." Sierra said amicably, and at that moment, Iseult admired her enormously. The boys looked at her and gave faint smiles, but Amber just coughed once, quietly.

"This is Amber Lee." Sirius said helpfully, a tinge of 'didn't-you-know' sarcasm in his voice.

"Hi Amber." Sierra said.

"Charmed." Iseult said with a smug smile, because it sounded clever and debonair in her head, but Amber just raised her carefully shaped eyebrows and gave a small, pained smile. Iseult mentally kicked herself.

"So, anyway," Amber said, ignoring her two new audience members, "As I was saying, we're renovating the house in St Tropez, so my holidays were a nightmare, I mean, I didn't even have my own pool for about a week, can you imagine? But we stayed with Lord Rothschild and his daughters for a week, which was simply divine..."

"Excuse me," Iseult said loudly, suddenly undazing herself from visions of St Tropez, "But we need to all get ready for practice now." She paused, nudging Sierra slightly in the hope that she would say something witty. Of course, Si never failed her.

"Yes, I'm sure that you boys wouldn't want to disappoint your fans, would you?" Sierra said coolly, tilting her head backwards in the direction of the stands, where a smattering of girls were holding up signs displaying such highly inventive slogans as "WE LOVE THE SEEKER!" and "WILL SCARLET'S RED HOT". Iseult hadn't noticed them before, but she was positive that every single one of those adoring, obsessive fans were hating Amber Lee right now.

Sierra's comment made the boys look up and laugh. Will nodded cheerfully, and announced that he was itching to get on a broom. Amber scowled, somehow managing to stay looking pretty as she did so. She shot a calculating glance at Sierra and Iseult, and Iseult had the disturbing feeling that she was being measured up.

"See you, Amber." Will said, waving and walking off. Sirius smiled broadly at her, Jack saluted cheekily and followed Will, and James just grinned like a lunatic and nodded happily as she blew him a kiss. So the two girls and one 'pair of legs' were left on the quidditch pitch. Amber stood up instantly as soon as James turned around, pulling down her pale denim skirt, which was amazingly, shorter than Sierra's school one by far. She flicked her hair and looked around nervously, as if to check that she would not be seen speaking to such embarrassing individuals.

"So." She started, her voice flat and unamused. "You two...are girls...and you play quidditch?"

Iseult raised her eyebrows, thinking that this girl must really be dumb, and saw Sierra do the same. Amber saw their expressions and rolled her eyes, as if they were the slow-minded ones. She put one hand on her hip.

"Well that's a bit butch, isnt it?" she said, looking at them as if they were both some kind of unhygienic swamp creature. Sierra tilted her head, looked at the girl closely, and laughed shortly. Iseult looked at Sierra as if she were mad. Why was Sierra laughing? This was the beginning of a catfight and she was laughing?

"Oh, My, God." Sierra burst out. "Did you not READ last month's 'Sorceress'?" Sierra was putting on her best sarcastic Hollywood Starlet voice. "Quidditch is so IN! I mean, Circe Monroe modelled her whole season on Quidditch Gear!" she said, laughing happily. "I heard that Tia Blue started her own Women's Quidditch team!"

Sierra stopped, to see that Amber was staring at her in disbelief. Iseult sniggered, and joined in.

"Oh my God! I know! Did you see those black Ducci kilts? We should sooo see if we can wear them for matches!" She bobbed her hands up and down dramatically as she spoke, tripling the effect.

"Uh-huh-huh!" Sierra giggled. "Bye Amber!" she said brightly, and she and Iseult grinned, and turned around, laughing all the way to the changing rooms. Amber just muttered something after them.

"You what?" Nike said when they appeared in the girls changing room, laughing, and recounted their mockery to her.

"Do you think she'll realise that we were making fun of her?" Iseult wondered aloud as she hurriedly pulled on some track pants and her quidditch robes.

Sierra was sorting through her bag, trying to find her quidditch boots. "Does it matter? She doesn't appear to be the cleverest witch in the school, does she? Ah-hah! Found them!" she said as she proceeded to un-knot the laces.

"Well of course she isnt." Nike commented, sitting on the bench fully dressed waiting for her team mates. "Reckon she only into the school through bribery. Her father's a walking goldmine!"

Iseult nodded thoughtfully. "So we can't do away with the notion of plastic surgery then?" she said cheekily. The girls laughed, and Iseult pondered that they were being quite cruel, considering that she had hardly committed any crime against them yet, apart from that of her reputation. Sierra finally got her boots on, and Nike grabbed Iseult a Starburst Racer 900 from the broom cupboard. Iseult turned the broom over and nodded, satisfied at the least.

"Lets go girls." She said dramatically and Nike and Sierra rolled their eyes. The three of them walked out to meet the boys and Professor Byre (with her stomping boots) and they perched on their floating brooms in mid- air while listening to what Iseult assumed was Will's version of a team talk.

"Now, do we all know what the aim for this year is?" He shouted enthusiastically.

"Win." The team droned back.

"Very Good. Who are we going to beat?"

"Everyone."

"More specifically?"

"The Slytherins." The team muttered out the obvious. Soon after this, Nike pushed Will aside and the tactical session began.

"We have a fantastic team this year, but one thing that you all need to improve is your ball skills. Chasers and Keeper especially." Iseult groaned, the actual throwing and catching of the quaffle was not her strong point. "And teamwork. We need tactics and teamwork. That's how we're have to win." Iseult felt a little happier about this. She could race up and down the pitch, very fast, with the quaffle, when she got quite near to the goal, she would throw the quaffle approximately in Jack or Nike's direction, hope that they catch it, and then it would be their job to score. Now that's tactics. She thought, feeling clever.

By the time Nike and Will had stopped interrupting each other for the right to speak tactically, it was five O'clock, and Will had sworn to them all that they could be finished by five-thirty.

"Ok then, ball tosses!" Nike exclaimed with joy when instructed to choose an activity for them to occupy the next half hour. The team protested on hearing this, in particular the two beaters, who needed little practice at catching balls whatsoever. But the deputy captain was unrelenting, and the seven of them were arranged into odd little groups, and Nike, Iseult and Sierra ended up tossing a quaffle around in a circle for the next half an hour. Before long, Sierra and Iseult had started dropping it on purpose, just so that the fast dive down to get it would provide some diversity to the tedious routine.

Finally, the captain's whistle blew, and the two girls took graceful arching dives down to earth, and leapt off of their brooms, wincing at their aching legs. Sierra, motivated by the thought of the common room and supper, was changed in a flash, and the two girls chatted merrily about the pros and cons of sushi and chopsticks as they started to walk back up to the castle.

As they were plodding up the rambling path, the girls heard slinking footsteps.

"Hello." Came a lost-sounding voice behind them. Iseult stopped and swerved around, paranoidly expecting another minor confrontation with Amber. It was Sirius.

"Hello! How's the Arithmancy going?" Sierra said back, sounding somewhat happier. Iseult looked at her friend with a calculating look. "I...I mean..." Sierra stammered quickly, but gave up in the end, looking down at the ground. Iseult's brain whirred, but in the end she decided that Sierra must be joking, and gave a half-hearted giggle, making Sirius look slightly more disturbed. The three of them walked in silence for a few moments, the girls a step or two ahead.

"So," Sirius said finally, possibly at a loss without at least one of his friends for backup, "How'd you enjoy that first Quidditch practice?"

Iseult tossed her head and ignored him.

**_Sierra_**

The walk back from the quidditch pitch was relatively uneventful, and mainly involved Iseult shooting Sierra calculating looks while Sierra walked in silence and Sirius followed about two feet behind them.

The trio reached the castle in uncomfortable silence, well, with the exception of Sirius who was silent but seemed cool, calm and collected. They stepped into the entrance hall and Sierra excused herself to go to the bathroom.

"Okay," said Iseult "See you in the common room then."

And with that she walked off towards the Gryffindor Tower.

Sierra watched her leave before turning and walking down the corridor. She was exhausted and therefore slightly disorientated. She stopped and looked around her. "It's down that hall and to the right" Sirius' voice told her.

She turned around and saw him a few steps behind her. Why was she finding it slightly hard to breathe? And why on earth was he allowed to wear such flattering pants?

She carried on, taking a few deep breaths to bring the blood back to her fingers. She found the bathrooms well enough, and moved straight to the mirror, inspecting her tired eyes. She fluffed her hair up a bit, but then stopped herself. She looked down and pressed her eyes shut.

"I don't like Sirius Black, I don't like Sirius Black…" she whispered to herself softly.

She took a few extra moments to compose herself, before putting on an extremely nervous smile, smoothing down her skirt and pushing the swingy door open.

Once outside the bathroom she looked around, but couldn't see Sirius anywhere. She ignored the extremely confusing feeling of disappointment in the pit of her stomach and walked down the hall, in which she hoped was the direction of the Gryffindor Common Room.

She walked on, dazed and slightly confused. Why was she so disappointed?! What was she even disappointed about?! Seriously, she wasn't exactly going to LET anything happen even if it did.

Her rambling thoughts were interrupted by a strong grip on her arm. She let out a quick shriek but another hand shot out and covered her mouth. She struggled unsuccessfully against the grip for a moment, before she was pulled quickly into the nearby broom closet. She briefly wondered what Filch would say if he knew some armed sex offender was using his meticulously kept closets for a bit of fun.

As soon as she was dragged all the way in the door closed, leaving Sierra and the stranger in complete and total darkness.

She blinked, trying to get her eyes to focus in the lack of light. She felt herself be slowly turned around, and the hand that was covering her mouth be taken away. She opened her mouth to say something incredibly brave and tough-sounding, but was cut off by the hand being replaced by a set of lips.

Eep! She thought, finding it very hard to organise a set of thoughts. Seriously, did anyone actually realise how hard it was? It was a few seconds before Sierra finally clicked on to exactly who was kissing her, and who she was kissing back.

Suddenly, the whole being-pressed-up-against-a-wall-in-a-dark-cupboard-and- made-out-with seemed very romantic.

She had to hand it to Sirius, it was a nice touch.

Even if she did have to slap his hand away from her top.

* * *

**_AUTHORS NOTE:_** winces Yeah I know alot of the stuff mentioned wasn't around back then, but I'm really not into in-depth researching so you'll all have to deal with it. Hope you enjoyed this one!

**_DISCLAIMER:_** I don't own anything. The pen is now back in my boss' posession. Stink.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter Thirteen: Fights of Many Varieties (aka. a chapter of pure fluff)**

_**Iseult**__  
_  
Innocently unaware of what her friend was getting up to in the broom cupboard downstairs, Iseult skipped lightly up the stairs and uttered the password ("Aristophanes") brightly to the fat lady. The portrait swung open, revealing the stone archway, which Iseult bounded through, emotionally high from being on the broom.

"Hi James, Hi Remus," she called out as she passed them on the way to the dormitory stairs. Both the boys were sunken deeply into the scarlet armchairs by the empty fireplace; James's hair was carefully messed up even more than it had been when he had got off the broomstick. Both of them were startled and looked up suddenly before slinking back into more debonair positions on the armchairs. Iseult narrowed her eyebrows suspiciously and continued on upstairs to get changed.

_**Sierra  
**_  
Sierra crawled through the portrait of the fat lady, trying very had to contain herself. Her whole body seemed to burn with excitement, and the urge to jump (or at least twitch copiously) was almost overpowering.

She spotted Ginger and Ash over in the corner, doing some kind of homework. So she skipped over to them merrily, and sat down in an armchair next to Ash.

"Its evil," Ash told Ginger, glaring at the piece of parchment in front of her "It's evil and it's going to kill me. You know it wants to."

Ginger sighed.

"Its transfiguration homework Ashfae, it cannot feel, it cannot think and above all it cannot be evil."

"But it is!" Ash wailed back.

Ginger rolled her eyes, then looked at Sierra, who was grinning like some kind of loon.

"Where the hell have you been?!"

"Uh," She replied "Nowh-"

She was cut off by Asfae hissing loudly.

"She's been making out with someone."

"Have not!" Sierra hissed back

"I can tell"

"How!?"

"SHUT UP BOTH OF YOU." Ginger rolled her eyes and tried to calm Ash "Just talk normally, seriously, there is no need for this little hissy-fest okay?"

"Fine," They both grumbled.

"Now, Ash. Tell Si the very obvious reason that we can tell she's been having a huge make-out session."

Ash grinned, clearly loving every moment.

"Well, lets see. Firstly, you're hair is mussed-up."

"That was from quidditch practice!" Sierra defended herself

"Whatever. Secondly, you've got some lipgloss right…" she pointed high up on her cheek. "Here."

Sierra frantically rubbed her face and moaned "Oh dear god, do you think anyone noticed? More specifically Iseult?"

The two girls looked at her sympathetically.

"Iseult is out looking for you, you've been gone at least two hours."

"And I don't think anyone saw you," Ginger began, "Eh, except for, uh, James."

She mentally kicked herself and casually looked around the room.

"Uh, Ging?"

"Yeah..."

"Why does Remus look like he wants to decapitate me?"

Ginger threw her hands in the air.

"You have to be THE dumbest person I have ever met Sierra."

"Dumber than me?!" Ashfae piped up conversationally

"Close, but not quite."

Sierra was confused, a hell of a lot confused.

"What?! Seriously, I don't get it!"

Ginger stood up, and patted Sierra on the head.

"Never mind, you'll get it someday."

"Tell me!" Sierra wailed, "You cant just say you know something and then not tell me! That's like receipt withholding!"

"What's a ress-it?" asked Ash, as Ginger walked off.

"Muggle invention."

"Oh. Um, Si. I have the slightest feeling that you should get changed before Iseult catches you looking like you've just been having a good romp" (This was signified by a few winks from Ashfae) "Which, of course, you have... but still"

"Yeah," said Sierra absently "You're right. Okay, I'll be back."

She turned and began to walk towards the girls dorms, but Ashfae called after her. "Oh, and by the way, Black just walked in. Don't look you moron!"

Sierra tried to take Ash's advice, and instead of rushing over and trying to jump him, she slowly walked up the stairs, without even a glance in his direction.

_'Go me!'_

She walked back down the stairs ten minutes later. She had finally decided on her black track pants, and her black polo neck. She had never really been the type of girl who would always dress in sexy clothes just to impress their boyfriend.

Actually, she'd never really had a boyfriend before.

She walked over to where Ashfae was hitting her head against the wall, ignoring the feeling of a set of eyes on her back. As she plopped herself into a plump armchair she heard a voice coming from the portrait hole.

"For gods sake Si! Where the hell have you been!!"

Sierra felt the overpowering urge to crawl under the table. Ashfae paused her head-bashing for a moment, shot Sierra a pitiful glance, then resumed it again.

"Uh, hi Iseult!" she said nervously, smiling a small smile at Iseult and praying to god that she wouldn't hurt her too much.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? I'VE BEEN LOOKING EVERYWHERE FOR YOU, YOU WERE ONLY SUPPOSED TO GO TO THE TOILET THEN COME BACK! TWO HOURS! TWO BLOODY HOURS YOU TOOK GOING TO THE TOILET!"

"Uh," said Sierra "Really?" she laughed nervously "Wow, didn't notice the time slip by."

"What were you doing?!" Iseult shouted. For a minute Sierra was slightly deafened by her shrieking.

"Uh, well, I got a bit, side tracked"

She glanced across, to where Sirius was sitting, playing an innocent game of wizards chess with Peter.

"With what?!"

"I think the question is, with who…" Ashfae snickered, just loud enough for Sierra to hear her.

Sierra blushed and tried her hardest to ignore Ash, "Eh, well, I went to the owlery, and I wrote this huge long letter to Tristan and Justin. You know how they liked to be informed on everything. And I must have, uh, not noticed the time!"

"Oh." Said Iseult, obviously disappointed at the fact she didn't have anyone to shout at.

"Uh, yes..."

"Anyway!" she said happily "Where's Trin, I have to get her to do my homework for me."

Ash cackled. Iseult groaned and put her head in her hands.

"WHAT have you done to her Ash?"

"Nothing!" she said innocently, sitting down in a chair "Well, not unless you count tying her up and shoving her up the fireplace."

It seemed quite far-fetched, but you could never really know with Ash.

Iseult got up to check in the fireplace, while Sierra slowly dropped off to sleep. Nice armchair, comfy armchair...

snore

_**Iseult**_

Iseult removed her head from the chimney and threw her head back to clear the imaginary coal dust out of her hair. She pushed her hair behind her ears and walked over to where Sierra was dropping off to sleep in the armchair. She put her hand on her hips and huffed over her drowsy friend, rolling her eyebrows.

"She must have crawled out when I wasn't looking, sneaky cow." Ashfae said amicably of Trin when Iseult sat down opposite her and Ginger. Iseult rolled her eyes disapprovingly, making Ash laugh.

"Sierra's been having a fun time, hasn't she?" Ashfae added after a brief lapse of talk.

"Ash!" Ginger hissed quickly, glaring at Ash from behind a curl of red hair.

Iseult looked at the pair warily.

"Ah, well Quidditch was okay..." she stopped when she saw the amused look on Ash's face. "Wha...What?"

Ash said nothing, but just looked over Iseult's shoulder with interest.

Deeply confused, Iseult swivelled around and rested her arm on the back of the chair, so she could see the whole common room. The comm was emptier than normal, almost everyone was enjoying the good weather outside. But, Iseult noticed, everyone did look a little strange.

To start with, James was reading, and Remus, his opposite in all ways, as far as Iseult knew, was shooting stabbing looks at various people around the room. Secondly, Peter and Sirius were playing wizards chess. SIRIUS was playing wizards chess. Iseult wondered if perhaps Amber had openly expressed something about how she liked guys who played wizards chess. Although she doubted that Amber, the school's resident bombshell, would be interested in any activity that involved brainpower at all.

Iseult sat back around, and tilted her head slightly to the side.

"What has Sirius done to Remus for him to glare like that?" she asked, pointing vaguely over her shoulder.

"I think that the question is, why is Sirius grinning like a dog?" Ash implied cheerfully, but winced later when Ginger kicked her in the back of her leg.

Iseult looked around and nodded when she saw Sirius beaming madly.

"Now that's scary. Oh, look, it's Aless and CJ."

Iseult temporarily forgot about the odd expressions of her housemates, and gestured her friends over from the archway.

"Um...Hello? She's in Ravenclaw!" Ginger muttered under her breath, but Iseult ignored her, and made room for CJ to sit down on the arm of the chair. Aless greeted everyone before drifting off to where the boys were congregating around the hearth. The girls chatted together for a while, snide comments about CJ's Ravenclawness aside, before Aless appeared again at Iseult's shoulder.

"Hey girls," he said cautiously, as if they would bite him. "Who has Sirius just been frolicking with?"

Ginger tensed, but Iseult looked at Aless questionably.

"How did you know...?"

Aless shrugged and looked at the ceiling. CJ smiled.

"What do you think we've been doing all afternoon, Ise?" she grinned. The group laughed as one, and the noise disturbed the girl sleeping nearby.

"Oh, Sierra's waking up." Ginger said happily.

"She must be so tired, I know how she feels." CJ yawned.

Suddenly something in Iseult's brain clicked. Her mind whirred and the cogs of understanding slotted into place.

"Sierra." She said simply. Something in her voice warned the others and Aless and CJ also had moments of understanding. Ginger kicked Ash for no particular reason, apologising very quickly afterwards.

So by the time that Sierra had got up, grinning from ear to ear, and trudged over to where they were all gathered, Ging and Ash were deeply engrossed in a slapping fight.

"Hel-lo." Sierra yawned happily upon moving herself into the little circle.

She was greeted with more enthusiastic and possibly more sarcastic greetings than normal, but she failed to notice.

Iseult felt very confused. She thought that Sierra hated Sirius with a passion, and she had tried to replicate this enthusiastic enmity in herself. Or perhaps it had been the other way round? Or both? Confused was to put it mildly.

Iseult stood up and pulled out her wand.

"Accio swimming togs." She muttered in as discreet a manner as she could manage. Iseult stepped away, with the intention of slipping out unnoticed.

"Where are you going, Ise?" Sierra said innocently. Iseult looked at her friend, and instantly felt a welling up of something that was part jealousy and part betrayal, because Sierra wasn't who Iseult thought she had been. She didn't like it.

"Swimming."

When Iseult was a little hurt, a little angry, she yelled. When she felt like exploding, she went away, was reclusive. The lake had seemed like a good idea.

Iseult ignored the looks and Ash's snide remarks, and calmly swung open the fat lady's portrait, and stomped down the first few stairs, hoping that the lake would be warmer than last time. At the fourth stair down, Iseult stopped and waited for a second, wondering if she should wait for someone to come after her.

Five seconds.

Ten seconds.

Fifteen, twenty, one minute. Iseult frowned and felt unloved. She looked down the winding staircase, and realised that she really didn't want to trudge down hundreds of cold marble steps, and she wished she had a broom. Iseult had told everyone that she hadn't brought her broom to school, but really she didn't have one. Her last one had been badly broken up when she fell for another seeker's Wronski feint at a match in Beauxbatons.

But then again, perhaps she could get access to a broom...

"Accio Nimbus 920!" she muttered loudly, swishing her wand. She waited for a second, and then sat down on the steps, waiting for Sierra's broom to appear. For a moment she thought that Nike had locked the brooms up, until she heard the familiar swishing of broom-twigs in the wind, and she reached up to grab the racing broom in both hands.

"Up." She whispered to the sleek broom, mounting it as it rose up and hovered above the steps. She pulled the broom in an upwards spiral until she was hovering in the vertical corridor between the staircases.

Iseult paused for a moment, listening for a scuffle on the stairs or shout in a corridor below, for a sign of someone who might notice a flash of black robes diving down between the stairs. But the loudest thing she heard was silence. Iseult grinned and took a sudden dive on the broom, straight down, clutching her bathing suit tightly under one arm as she hugged the broom between her knees and plummeted between the stories.

Iseult brought the broom to an abrupt halt at the bottom, dismounted daintily, and put the broom under her wing as she strode out into the crisp early evening air.

Iseult walked out to the lake, shimmering and dark, and wondered if the giant squid was nearby. She got changed in Hagrid's tool shed, and went out to the lakeside, and sat on a large rock, basking and imagining the squid throttling Sirius and Sierra with two of it's arms. A guilty smile crept across her face as she realised how hypocritical she was being. Iseult just felt that she had been tricked.

Eventually she slipped off the rock, and stepped down into the water, the chill washing against her ankles. She took a loud breath and crouched down, before putting her head underwater and kicking out into the deep lake. Iseult floated on her back for a while, looking up at the sky, her face bathed in sunlight. She lay peacefully for a while, the water lapping at the sides of her body, until she head raucous laughter and splashing on shore. Iseult shivered, but ignored the sounds, willing them to go away.

"Oi! Peregrine!" a harsh voice shouted. Iseult jolted up in the water quickly, and squealed as she stubbed her toe on the bottom of the lake. The people onshore laughed, and she spun around to see a few boys, who she assumed to be Slytherins judging by demeanour, gathered around the pasty boy who had harassed her on the train.

"Snape..." she muttered under her breath.

"There's a giant squid in there, you know." A polished voice called out. The voice came from the mouth of a slick-haired blonde boy in plain black robes. Iseult recognised him from her runes class.

"Yeses, you wouldnst wants its to steal your clotheses." The boy who said this either had a speaking disorder or a very queer accent. Iseult was glaring at the group on the shore, but thought nothing of the comment until one of them held up her pair of jeans and started waving them around.

'Oh Shit.' She thought. Iseult instinctively reached for her wand, to where it normally would have been in her pocket, but she grasped water, and swore in annoyance.

"Or anyone else, for that matter." This voice came from Severus himself, Iseult pondered angrily as she stood, arms crossed in the cold water. "This is a nice broom, where did you get it?" he continued, his voice dripping in sarcasm, pulling Sierra's Nimbus 920 out from behind his back. Iseult's eyes widened and she wanted to have her wand more than anything...

She was acutely aware of her helplessness, standing there in the water, not wanting to get out and afraid to ignore them. So she had stayed quiet.

But then a voice came from out of the shadows of the tool-shed, and Iseult felt saved.

"For God's sake, put it down, Snape." Said the voice coolly. Five heads turned from the shore and another golden head turned from the lake to see a lone Gryffindor fourth-year leaning against the shed. Iseult took a few steps forward hopefully.

"Why would you care, Morrigan?" Said the slick-haired boy cheerfully. His name was Lucius, Iseult remembered. Lucius...

"Malfoy," Jack said, one eyebrow raised, "I used to think that you were the most stuck-up person I knew, but encouraging this bunch of pathetic tag- alongs to steal the chaser's clothes?" he shook his head sadly. "I think you need to get your head further up your arse. If that's even possible..."

Iseult noticed that he had quietened down at the end of his phrase, as he stepped out of the shade of the building. Sweet. He doesn't want me to hear him swearing at Slytherins. Evidently he hasn't heard a lot about Sierra...

Lucius Malfoy was glaring at the Gryffindor, in what he probably hoped was a menacing fashion. Snape's eyes were also on Jacques, his face twisted into an aloof sneer, every now and then shooting calculating glances in Iseult's direction. The other boys behind him were hitting their open palms with their fists dumbly. From her position in the lake, Iseult thought that the Slytherins looked like a Mafia gang from an old movie, and the dumb- looking boys were the hired thugs.

"Ah, but the difference is, I have an excuse..." Malfoy started, but Jack rolled his eyes and cut him off.

"Put the clothes back...Give...the broom to me..." Jack's voice was blown away by the wind, and Iseult only heard fragments. "You're sh...cowards...girls..."

Iseult took the opportunity of her apparent defence, and waded further into shore. The water was up to her knees, but she shivered. Jacques heard her, and looked around. Iseult smiled nervously and looked pointedly at the pair of jeans, wherein her wand was pocketed.

Snape laughed, a bitter, croaked sound, as Jack turned around. "Stop gawking, Morrigan, you wouldn't want her boyfriend and his bitch to come around to you, would you?" he reproached slyly, and his friends chuckled. Jacques turned around, glaring at Snape fiercely.

Jack walked forward, right up to where Snape was standing. "Just give me the broom." He said, close enough to punch him in the face. Snape stepped back to the edge of the lake, and sneered. Jack sighed, and walked forward again.

"I happen to know a spell that makes the giant squid infinitely attracted to whoever I choose." Jack said coolly. He pulled out his wand discreetly. Iseult saw Lucius and his muscular friends do the same. Snape gulped, quite obviously, his grasp on the broom weakening. Jacques took the opportunity and snatched the handle from his grasp. Snape jumped in response, reaching forward to take the broom back instinctively, but his foot slipped on the mud of the lake-side and he lost his balance. Iseult saw a grin spread across Jacques's face as he gently pushed Snape back at the shoulders, and the Slytherin fell slowly into the muddy lake. Laughter echoed from all sides, although Malfoy and his friends seemed to be slowly backing off. Iseult's clothes had been dropped to the ground when they had pulled out their wands, but now the small group were inching away. Iseult waved at them mockingly. Snape floundered about for a while in the dark water.

"Watch out for the squid!" Iseult called happily, stepping out of the lake and walking over to retrieve her towel from Jack, who had started to look around shiftily, as if he wanted to be somewhere else. Snape jumped up when he heard this, and clambered up the muddy bank hurriedly. He looked a sight, his knees covered in mud and strands of the pale-green pondweed that collected around the edges of the lake draped over his shoulders. He scowled at them both, before stalking off inside. Iseult would have felt sorry for him if had obviously not just been planning to steal or vandalise the broom. Speaking of which...

Iseult picked up the broom and turned to Jacques, overriding plans of gracious owed thanks with an urgent thought.

"Oh god, I need to get this back to the broom cupboard. It's Sierra's." she said hurriedly to Jack, who jumped, and looked at her oddly.

"Can't you just..."

Iseult finished his sentence with an accuracy that many people found unnerving. "Take it back before dinner? No, I don't know where it came from," she blushed. "I used a summoning charm." Iseult braced herself for inquisitive questions, but her inquisitor simply nodded, and took it from her hands.

"Go get changed." He ordered simply, before pulling out his wand and muttering. "Oicca..." Iseult heard him whisper as she gathered up her clothes, and through a crack between the wooden planks of the door, she saw a riderless broom floating away.

It was slowly getting darker, and Jack was just leaving as Iseult stepped out of the shed. Slightly hurt that he would not have waited for her at all, she gathered her towel and bathers and they walked inside, and out of the gathering dusk.

"Thank you, so much, for all that." Iseult said finally, when they were at the door, trusting that he understood what 'all that' meant.

"Yes." Jack said simply. Iseult had expected him to say something more gratifying. "I would have liked to have tried out my squid-attracting charm though..." he said with his awkward smile. She had the strangest feeling that he was laughing at her. His eyes were laughing at her. Iseult said nothing, and the laughter faded.

"See you at Quidditch practice." Jack said shortly as they entered the great hall, and he walked away to sit down.

Iseult didn't see Sierra until dinner, when she walked into the great hall and found Iseult already at the table, sitting across the table from Jack in amused silence. Jack was looking down the table, listening to the conversation of the 4th year sitting next to him. Iseult was hoping that the spell had worked, and that Sierra's broom was now safely in a broom cupboard somewhere.

"Hi..." Sierra said, sitting down across the table from Iseult, who was glancing over her shoulder every few moments and smirking. When Si sat down, Iseult jumped, recalling the memory that she had been subconsciously plotting ways to put Jack's squid-attracting charm to use, and make the giant squid eat Sierra. But Iseult was feeling somewhat more refreshed since then, and settled for glaring at Sierra haughtily before resuming normal conversation, making a mental note to snub her later.

"I had an interesting swim." Iseult commented nonchalantly. Jack looked sideways across the table at her suspiciously, but neither of the girls noticed.

"What happened to Snape?" Sierra asked Iseult, as a mud-stained and soaking figure crept in as inconspicuously as he could manage, which was not very. Iseult suppressed a giggle.

"I honestly have no idea, Si..."

_**Sierra**_

Sierra raised an eyebrow.

Iseult ignored her and coldly greeted someone over Sierra's shoulder.

Sierra looked behind her, and smiled happily at Sirius, Remus, James and Peter. "Hi." She said to them.

Sirius grinned sneakily and slid onto the seat next to Sierra, sneaking his arm around her waist. She grinned and didn't fight it, until she remembered Iseult sitting opposite her. She wiggled away from Sirius, discreetly pushing his arm off her. She ignored Sirius' look of disappointed confusion.

"Anyway," she said to Iseult "Why did you say you had an interesting swim?" she faked an air of nonchalance.

Iseult, who unbeknownst to Sierra, had seen the little display tossed her strawberry blonde hair and continued ignoring her, instead greeting Ash, Ginger and Alessandro who were walking over, followed by Trinity who was glaring at Ash determinedly.

"Hi." The group greeted those at the table.

Iseult shuffled over so that Trin could sit next to her. Sierra shuffled over to let Ginger and Ash in, but was pulled towards Sirius.

"Eep!" she said.

_**James**_

James put his feet on the table, looking around the room haughtily, looking very cool. He glanced quickly at Iseult, who was talking to Sierra, and then glanced at Jack sitting across from her. They had been sitting there when he arrived.

He glanced between the two again. Jack had never really ever shown interest in any girls, especially not Iseult. Nothing to worry about...

He thoughts were interrupted by Ashfae, hitting his legs hard with a spatula.

"For gods sake, Potter, get your legs off the table."

Trinity glared at her from across the table, showing her displeasure at having to sit within Ashfae's vicinity, yet having nothing to criticize with the situation.

"Sorry," said James, grinning charmingly at Ashfae and swinging his legs off the table.

Ashfae looked at him suspiciously, then slowly turned back to Ginger to continue their conversation. He looked quickly at Iseult to see if she reacted to his obvious flirting with Ashfae. Sadly, she had neither noticed nor cared.

_'Damn,'_ he thought.

He looked to his side, to where Sirius was sitting next to him, Sierra sitting on his other side.

'Jammy bastard.' He thought sourly.

He looked up, towards the other end of the table, and casually threw a carrot at Sirius. By the disgruntled sound from beside him, he was willing to guess that he had hit his mark. He leaned over to say something to Ash and Ginger, when something gooey and soft hit the back of his head.

He scraped the mashed potato off the back of his head, and threw it at Remus, who ducked. The potato flew through the air and landed on the back of a girl's robes. The enraged Hufflepuff stood up and spun round, glaring at him and Sirius. They looked back at her with an expression of pure innocence.

James glanced at Iseult, who was grinning at the Hufflepuff girl. The girl narrowed her eyes at James, and in the split second that took to blink his eyes, she threw a large chunk of garlic bread at him.

Naturally, as the marauders were already so skilled in the art of food fights, it was only a few seconds before food was flying all over the room. Sirius nudged James, just after he had been hit in the eye with a roast potato.

"Watch this!" he yelled over the crowd, and threw half a roast chicken at Snape, knocking him off the chair he was sitting on.

"Nice," said Sierra, nodding solemnly "I'll give you ten points for that one."

"No way!" yelled Sirius back "That was worth at least fifty!"

Iseult rolled her eyes and half-heartedly tried to stop Ashfae from pouring a bowl of peas, milk, coffee and pumpkin juice down Trin's robes. Trin screamed and hit Ash over the head with her spoon.

It was at least another quarter of an hour before Professor McGonagall managed to calm down the hall and restore some kind of order. James looked at his peers, seated around him. Sirius was casually picking pieces of pumpkin out of Sierra's hair, Iseult was wiping some of the food off her hair with a napkin, Trin was covered from head to toe in white gunk, Ashfae had rice up her nose, Ginger was complaining loudly that she would never be able to get the soup stains off the back of her robes and Remus was grinning across at him like a loon. A loon with carrots in his hair.

McGonnagal stood at the front of the hall, yelling at the students wildly and waving her arms about a lot. James leaned over and whispered in Sirius' cauliflower-covered ear.

"Not too sure about Sierra, but I would have given you sixty for the chicken mate..."

* * *

_**AUTHORS NOTE:**_ I'm glad you guys are enjoying the story so far. I've only got one more chapter tucked away, so I'm beginning to write frantically. However, thanks to the fact that I tend to get random bursts of inspiration, its being written in various short snippets which I have to find ways to put into the fic. Anyway, please, please review. Its reviews that give me the motivation to keep writing, which is going to be hard now that there's only me to write this (I'm used to having Pie as a sounding board for my ideas, and to continue the fic when the plot bunnies have gone hopping away).

**PLEASE REVIEW!**

**_DISCLAIMER:_** I own, literally, nothing. Don't sue me, please.


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